Prince George, B.C. – The provincial government confirmed $355 million in education funding for all of B.C.’s 60 school districts this week – including just over $9 million for School District 57.

The money will allow for the hiring of just over 80 teachers and specialists in the district and over 3,300 province-wide. 

It’s the result of the BC Teachers’ Federation victory in the Supreme Court of Canada last November in their case against the Province.

The funding varies based on each district’s restored local language (click here to see how much money each district received).

“This is quite amazing because we’ve been waiting for this for quite some time,” says Richard Giroday, president of the Prince George and District Teachers’ Association. “What it indicates to me is that our district has done its due diligence in terms of determining what the needs were for the restoration of our contract language.”

“This is of course a good news story,” adds Tim Bennett, chair of the district’s board of education. “Anytime that we receive funding from government is good because it means more teachers in front of students and smaller class sizes.”

Along with using the money for the hiring of 83.5 full/time equivalent staff in the district, he says part of the funding will also be used to accommodate the opening of Springwood Elementary School.

“This funding will begin flowing to districts in the fall,” says the Ministry of Education. “Final funding allocations for each district will not be known until September 2017, because amounts may be adjusted slightly up or down to reflect actual classroom organization.”

The money comes about a week before schools districts must submit their 2017-2018 budgets to the Ministry of Education.