Frustration mounts..
I don't know what is worse, having a "kids and learning" document, that while it sounds great in principle, probably won't be completed during the shelf life of this provincial government or having to watch the ads for it or for the Teacher's Union that follow. We are spending taxpayer money in the government's case, advertising a program that is not even happening yet! This is an extreme waste of money (and in case it is pointed out that they do it nationally as well with econ action plan, I don't support those ads either). As much as we cut administration, money seems to be going back to advertising. And the "new" $6.7 million for this plan is most likely going to come from cuts we are going to be making on behalf of the government.
As I have said previously, I have no issue making changes, cutting jobs and balancing budgets if we are all striving towards the same goals as a province. All for now.
Role of a school board member continued..Thank you to everyone who has given feedback to Board officials and reps. I have received 20 emails and the subject and they are leaning slightly to the keep policy as is. We had a full discussion with staff to discuss the pros and cons for keeping the schools open and many things came up that I had not considered. Here is a quick list:
Like to thank everyone for their views and feedback on snow days. Just a key point for everyone to refer to. Members can be your voices at the table when it comes to policy. We do not make the day to day decisions around the table, but we put in place the policies to guide staff. In the interview below, the Superintendant confirms what many thought obvious by your emails.
So the emails and outraged calls are fine and I can take your views to the Board, but please understand that we build the policy only. I am not on the phone telling staff to keep school open or closed. As with any matter, we approach this based on policy only. I appreciate your feedback on how we make our policies better/ stronger for HRSB.
Storm Day Debates
Keep Open all the time
- Expectation that teachers arrive to work
- Consistent/ No confusion
- Parents don't have to arrange for student placement with friends, neighbours etc.
- Parents make their own decisions on whether to keep students at home due to safety concerns
- No lost learning time? (see below)
- Buses could be cancelled and parents make decision to drive or find transport
- Avoids closing if we get a weird weather shift
- Less pressure on lower income families that might have to pay for people to watch their children which may cost as much as going to work.
Close system/ family of schools
- No issues with student safety
- Feedback was given that in some schools less than 10% of population will show up on days that aren't cancelled
- Often due to lack of students, teachers do not press forward with new lesson plans, so there is opportunity to catchup, but this becomes a "lost" teaching day
- A few years back we moved from 190 teaching days to 195 to make up snow days and PD
- Need for parents to find place for children to go for the day. This comes up a lot but if we are spending the time looking after students and not teaching, is this still a wasted day?
- We do not have the same infrastructure as many cities I have researched such as Edmonton, Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa. Many of those areas do not have as much bussing as we do that they would need to cancel. Students ride buses/trains/subway etc to get to school as they are mostly in the reachable part of the city.
- Discussed safe arrival and basically this became a nightmare and many staff had to answer all of the phone calls to stay on top of situation.
- When we tried closing by families of schools, we would get tonnes of phone calls to staff at the Board office complaining that one was open and another family wasn't. People are concerned that the Board values time for one over another.
- One senior staffer told us there is no worse feeling than sitting there on a storm day basically waiting for the day to end and praying there will be no fatalities with anyone involved in the school system. You would not want to be the one that gets that call!
This was a wide ranging discussion and I look forward to our debate on the subject either this month or next month knowing that we will not please everyone. I hope everyone can see why we go whatever route we do. Love to hear more feedback as well.
WELCOME BACK STUDENTS, PARENTS AND STAFF
I hope that everyone has had a wonderful summer, even if the weather did not completely cooperate. With school heading back this week, I hope that all parents will take the time to meet staff and make sure we have clarity with expectations from our students. This can really help to make the school year smoother. Meet your Principal and introduce yourself. As issues come up around school, it is always good to work with staff on a solution first before proceeding to the Board level. If you are not satisfied with results, then please let me know (via email is usually fastest) and we can elevate it to the Board. Most requests that come through me for bussing, class size, student safety, bullying etc are usually brought to the Senior Staff for investigation and then brought back to the relevant Board member or they work directly with the community member. Please contact me with any questions, or invitations to school events and SAC meetings.
This is my last year in the elected role for HRSB. I am hopeful that I will have some questions from potential new Candidates about my experience and time expectations etc. It has been at times very rewarding, and at times frustrating but a great way to serve your community. Look for more on my Dave's view page.
Bussing Issues
Each year there are new bussing issues that arise. This year, the URB has mandated that busstops will only occur max 3 times in 1.6 KM. This is the source of some issues and becomes an issue especially walking down some of our less friendly roads (Hammonds Plains for example). Between this and some of the courtesy buses stopping, there are quite a few issues in District 7. I need your help in making sure these get corrected asap. If there is a problem with the change in routes/ timing, please contact Stock Transport at 481-8400 and register your complaint. Many of these issues get worked out in the first week of school. If this is a permanent changee, please also register your complaint with the UARB. uarb.board@gov.ns.ca. Please make sure this is sent asap as I hope much of this gets resolved. I am working with staff, but theses steps need to be taken. Many thanks. The Joys and frustrations of being a Board Member.
I have been a Board member since October 2008. During that time, I have seen amazing educators and administrators working hard to provide the best education for our 50,000+ students. We have many dedicated staff at the Board office that work to support our educators and administrators so they can focus on teaching. I go into schools every month and see kids having success and fun. I listen to much talk about our test performance in provincial standards testing not being up to par, but then having great success in IB programming and PISA testing. In fact, many schools are doing very well.
When the board steps into some big decisions and discusses bigger policy issues, that is when we feel like we are having some effect. When I can support a consituent with a problem or concern, that is when I feel like I have been supportive. When the Board raises key questions with the Minister of Education, NDP Caucus and have discussions with the other parties about how we can improve education, that is when I feel good about being a Board member. When we complete huge projects like a Capital Plan, Imagine our Schools, French Immersion review or a full governance review, that is when I feel like the Board is being effective.
However, there is a flip side to this and most of it ties into the Department of Education, province and how the system is set up. It is a beast. While there are some quality people working for the province, I feel like much of the important work that we need to do is not being accomplished. For example, responsibility for building and closing schools should belong to one department- either the Board or the DOE needs to control funds allocated for buildings. That way as we build Capital Plans, we are not beholden to political interests.
There needs to be more flexibility at the school level so our teachers and administrators have some room to manouever where appropriate. We need to be able to support our rural schools in a different manner with different levels of support from the provincial government. If the system was governed differently, communities could work with Boards to decide on whether a school should close or not, based on how it is doing. Basically, the lines of reporting and governance need to be changed so that the Board are not relying/ waiting on DOE to get approval for new programs such as High School Financial literacy, new health promotion initiatives or mental health programming. Until some of the governance is changed between the Boards and Province, the Boards, schools and communities will have severe limitations on how far we can go to affect change.
Parental Feedback
A very important role for elected school board officials is to receive feedback from the community for use in policy making or other decisions such as school closures. It is imperative that a strong line of communication is kept between parents, schools and administration. I have been finding that some issues bubble to the surface very quickly while others take time to percolate. For any parents, please feel free to email on any issue that is on your mind around schools and I am happy to attempt to answer or get the answer for you. Please don't wait until it blows up until you involved the school staff or board as needed.
Rural Schools and Education delivery
The Board is waiting to hear from the provincial government on several issues including how they are goign to support rural schools, our request for a full financial literacy program and extra support for our energy management plan. It is painful to have to wait on other groups when we have the capacity to build programs that can be great for our students. We have now submitted a letter to the Premier and the Mayor asking for support in building a rural strategy for schools that will tie in with other agencies.
Great things happening in HRSB
In Spring 2011, HRSB board members met with CDHA Board members in order to have a initial conversation about how our organizations could work better together. There was a tremendous response in that meeting as many people have been discussing the concepts of "wraparound" schools in HRM and how schools could truly be community hubs, offering services from HRM, Provincial Departments including Health, Justice and Social Services and many other potential partners. We expect a follow up meeting in the next month continue this discussion to see how we can identify the synergies and also examine some cost saveing scenarios.
Staff continues to work diligently to bring the Board a complete Capital plan for the next decade. This is crucial as we will see some of their key directions and school reviews. Interested to see how this will play out across HRM.
My response to Budget Cut
A few key things to consider around the announcements. For the Halifax board, this cut is going to equate to a $11 million cut. The percentage spin does not include all the costs of living associated with increased power and oil, increasing salaries for the staff and other costs as they arise. When the government says they will maintain in special needs, IB and O2, this does not mean they will cover full positions as the Board will have to fund any salary increases or other increased costs in this area. This is a key point to consider.
The Halifax Board has a higher ratio than 15:1 in the classroom.
It seems there is a move to review some of the spending on the Hogg formula which will be interesting as we move forward. Many of the messages seem to be around the enrollment changes in the school boards. In reality this should help HRSB over time as we continue to have a higher percentage of the student population.
We have always been happy to review any administrative costs and look forward to the Minister defining administration with us so we know where the cuts must take place.
Lastly, I am still concerned about the graph that the government uses as a tool to show dollars versus the enrollment. As all people in the education department know we have added more programs. These have been outlined numerous times and add significant costs to our budget: mentors, reading recovery, increased special needs students, increased money for mentors and coaches, more IT demands, programs for Aboriginal and African Nova Scotians to name a few. Please consider these and other programs when you see the graph.
Budget Management Review (2010)
I need to start by saying that I truly believe that if we cannot generate new revenue, we must make cuts. This is simple. However, what is not simple is approaching all the Boards in NS and saying CUT, with no plan. While we are doing many things well in NS, there are far too many gaps that we are leaving for our students. We have not closed a technology gap; we have not created a sound financial literacy plan; we do not have enough resources for students that are either very high, or very low achievers; we have not met students in Junior High and High School where most of them need to be met; we have not prepared adequately as a province to educate the 21st century learners or compete in a global economy. The school system needs to be more proactive, less reactive and this can only be done through a nimbler, faster Department and Boards.
There is a big discussion that I believe all Nova Scotians need to take a part in. That is tell us how we can work to reform education in NS. Many provinces are already moving- PEI, NB and Alberta to name a few. If we are behind our countrymates, imagine how far we are behind Japan and China.
This review process has merely shown me that Government is not willing to lead this change or does not have a viable plan to move forward. This is not a slight as this is a absolutely massive rock to move as it involves P-12 and post secondary. We have to remember that right now, the single biggest expenditure is teacher's wages. Between all wages in HRSB, this accounts for over 85% of our total budget. So to make any kind of significant impact, that will mean JOBS, pure and simple. Cutting board overheads will not give $10million in savings. Cutting board staff will mean adding staff at the department of education or seriously overburdening our staff.
I want to address a few misconceptions out there. One of the biggest issues I have is with the Provincial government making the chart look so simple. The Premier has said that as enrollment declines that so should expenditures. This would be true if you could quickly close schools, fire teachers and re-arrange schools and classrooms on a year to year basis. Parents do not want that kind of model.
Thirdly, for all the people who think this is a room with a teacher, they need to reconsider. We have added new resources: O2, literacy coaches, IB, FLECS, math mentors, African NS support workers, EPAs for students with learning disabilities or special needs, computers in schools, Safe Schools coordinators, Personal collaboration time for teachers so that they can get better in their jobs, profile teachers to assist smaller schools deliver a strong program, Cap teachers, reading recovery teachers, ESL and youth pathways. Most of these roles were not around 10 years ago and most not even 5 years ago. These people help some of our most needy students as we try to help them catchup to their classmates.
In the short term we can look at the following: cut some administration, roll back some programming, give less resources to the students most in need, cut back complementary bussing in Halifax Proper, cut back PD days, cut down board governance expenditures, create revenue through broader Excel programming, rent out more space in schools.
Longer term: consolidate some schools in the peninsula, move to some P-12 models in areas like Musquodoboit, stop being so reliant on the "structure" the school and worry about what we are teaching, look at the school board model to find out if it is working and if there is consolidation what it would save, get rid of class caps, promote more distance education.
it is important to ensure that we have a thorough dialogue before we jump into any short term fixes that could hurt our province in the long term. We cannot be a knowledge economy without our students receiving the instruction that they need now. I value any feedback or comments you may have.