Holidays Over For School District 57

Tuesday, August 31, 2010 10:45 AM

Prince George, B.C.- It doesn't seem to matter how sharp the pencil is this fall, with the number of backpack-toting children heading into classes continuing to fall in School District 57, the budget crunch will continue...

Last March, SD57 Board of Trustees closed or re-configured six schools to erase a $5.2-million dollar shortfall, but $9-million more must be whittled away by 2014.

Taking questions from northern news media today about the upcoming school year, Education Minister, Margaret MacDiarmid, says while the situation in District 57 is not unique, it is an extreme case.

"One of the greatest challenges that School District 57 has faced is one that we can't do anything about and that's that the enrolment has gone down by about 25-percent," says MacDiarmid. "Since 2000, there are over 4,500 fewer students in the school system there. That's probably one of the hardest hit school districts, in terms of enrolment decline." This year, however, the drop seems to be a more modest one, with approximately 100 fewer students expected. 2010-2011 enrolment is estimated at 13,555 students.

The Minister points out, "The funding has remained the same: in years where the enrolment has gone down, we've actually provided at least as much funding as the previous year and, overall, funding is up per pupil by about 32-percent, so the funding has continued -- the difficulty is there has been such a drastic enrolment decline."

"The expectation around the province is that we're going to see enrolment decline probably stop in the next maybe three or four years, but it does differ from district to district."

MacDiarmid says she has spoken with school boards, parents and local MLAs about whether changes to the funding formula could make a difference, but, she says, there is already substantial supplementary funding for districts with rural schools to take factors like extreme weather and remote location into account.

"Next year, the supplementary funding is actually going up, so it's going from $143-million to $160-million, and that's for school districts with these unique geographic factors, so that's a 12-percent increase."

The Education Minister says taxing rural property owners more than those is urban areas is something she's not willing to look at as a solution. Instead, concepts like Neighbourhood Learning Centres are something she hopes districts will pursue. District 57 and the Regional District of Fraser-Fort George have launched a feasibility study to determine whether bringing community groups into the schools at Hixon, Giscome and Nukko Lake could stave off closure of those schools.

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Posted on Tuesday, August 31, 2010 10:45 AM in News by Michelle Cyr-Whiting

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Comments

Posted by: Mercenary on August 31 2010 11:26 AM

With people having fewer and fewer children these days AND jobs drying up in the areas in question it is no wonder that enrollment is down. There is going to have to be some creative solutions brought forward in order to keep these schools open. Unfortunately they might just have to close some more down just to keep the rest viable.

Posted by: Flash on August 31 2010 12:45 PM

There is another part of this as well, one the government has done a very good job of avoiding. How many downloaded costs has the school districts had to pick up since 2001? There are increases in MSP, BCESIS, huge costs for "accountability", not to mention wages increases (although readers should remember that the first wage increase given to staff was 7.5% over three years was NOT funded).

While I agree that when enrollment drops, it makes sense to close schools, there is more to this than that simple math. Perhaps when the minister of education talks about increases in funding, she should also be required to discuss the added costs that boards now have to bear(such as the carbon taxes and the program to run the the numbers). Let's make the government more accountable and open when these issues are dicussed. The voting public is not stupid-hiding these added costs does not further discussions about the future of education in this province.

Posted by: dnakamura on August 31 2010 7:13 PM

This morning my Rotary club colleague and I registered our foreign exchange student at PGSS. The whole process took us three hours. We started our day off at Continuing Learning Alternatives where the staff were extremely friendly and helpful. Then on to PGSS where one of their vice principals spent TWO HOURS with us translating and interpreting because he knew how to speak French. I'm sure part of it was this vice principal's outstanding personality. But how much of it was because of the overwhelming workload and people having to jump in to do a task that is not neccessarily in their job description. I was so impressed with the assistance we received from school district staff today. Amidst the stress of all the changes and ongoing changes, staff were absolutely brilliant. Thanks to the staff, this young guy won't be nearly as nervous starting school in a new country, new language and culture.

Posted by: gus on August 31 2010 7:35 PM

"MacDiarmid says she has spoken with school boards, parents and local MLAs about whether changes to the funding formula could make a difference"

I think she should speak to the Minister responsible for forests and forest fire suppression so that she can learn how to work from a base budget and simply start adding money to the kitty to do whatever it takes to get the students the best education they can get.

If forestry can do it just because of a few fires that will eventually burn themselves out, surely education can do it to invest in our future by bringing out the full potential of our youth.

;-)