Education Minister Preps For Return to Classes

Tuesday, August 26, 2008 10:46 AM

Prince George, B.C. – The new school year is just a little over a week away and for School District 57, that means fewer students. Although the numbers won’t be finalized until the end of September, it’s expected enrolment in School District 57 will be down by about 470 students.

In a conference call with media this morning Education Minister Shirley Bond says the story is much the same across B.C. “If I look at the numbers across the province the number is about 8,000 fewer students last year, so we are basically in a decade of decline.” She says things aren’t expected to change much for the next 7 years. Bond says the decline is not unique to B.C. “This isn’t a B.C. problem, it is the world’s problem.”

Minister Bond is excited about the new health programs which see the removal of junk food from schools and the introduction of more activity. “A new component to the program is the expectation that daily physical activity will be introduced in schools, all our k-9 students will have 30 minutes of activity each day and high school students will have 150 minutes per week.” There is no specific funding for this increase in activity program. “It is expected schools will create physical education programs that suite their needs”.

As for School District 57, Bond says the Board is proceeding with a number of recommendations from the Aboriginal School Task force. She says she has worked with the School Board on the recommendations to see how the Ministry can assist. The selection of a “choice school” has sparked both positive and concerned comments. “I would like to support them where possible, and I think all of us would like to see an improvement in the number of aboriginal students completing high school.”

The process to select a school that will be a “choice school” for aboriginal education will continue this fall with the expectation the school will be ready to accept students in the fall of 2009.

Provincial funding for education in the province is $5.68 billion dollars this year.

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Posted on Tuesday, August 26, 2008 10:46 AM in News by 250 News

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Comments

Posted by: Nowicki on August 26 2008 4:51 PM

470 students less in a year and 6% of share of total 8000 BC decline! While the population of PG is less than 2% of the BC population.

The share of a city with the poulation of PG should have been a decline of 150 students if the decline was distributed evenly. It means the declines in student no in PG is 3 times the average in BC.
That is 300 more students than the average of BC.

This could translate into 10% decline in UNBC enrolment, considering the dependence of UNBC on PG student population. More bad news for UNBC is coming ...

Posted by: astro on August 26 2008 8:44 PM

You said, "Minister Bond is excited about the new health programs which see the removal of junk food from schools and the introduction of more activity."
I wonder if she is just as exited as seeing the removal of the study of magnetism, including electro-magnetism from the junior science curriculum. When the generation of power is so important to our society, it is a wonder that she would allow such a topic to be excluded from this curriculum.
The junior science curriculum is something that every student studies and it is fundamental to scientific literacy. It seems that scientific literacy is not important to Minister Bond, as she signed off on the new curriculum, as image and the presence of saving money. I say that because the reasoning to remove electro-magnetism was to save money, as other provinces didn't include it in their curriculums.
Their mistake should excuse BC from omitting the topic.

Posted by: Don Wilkins on August 26 2008 11:31 PM

It always amazes me what the minister gets excited about. Is she excited that because of lack of funding, the schools used money from the machines to fund school programs. I am sure she has upped their budgets to cover the loss.

Or, is she amazed that the time students spend in math and english will be decreased? Mrs Bond, where adding daily physical activity is all well and good, what are you removing from the curriculum to compensate. It is like the addition of the family life and planning courses that where made compulsory. What was taken out? Well, less time in the rest of the classes of course. Then you wonder why grades may drop.

Shirley, you need to wake up and smell the manure that you spread!