Parent concerns and issues with school district budget April 3, 2013

 Very pleased by “Expanded committee of the whole” and consultation process  We do need more time for going out for consultation with parents – two months would be minimum  In time we’ve had, we’ve:  had conversations at DPAC table, with PAC representatives  distilled concerns heard by Executive

 School fees – some parents feel nickled and dimed to death  School supplies  Field trips  Cultural trips  School pictures  Extra supplies  This and that and something else  Do want policies followed for access to field trips for our vulnerable parents and students  Don’t want PACs to be just engines for fundraising

 Buildings and facilities  crossing guards  sidewalks  design of parking lots  classrooms and desks cleaned regularly  paths cleared of snow and ice  recess and lunch supervision – going from daycare to school levels can be difficult to understand  Interpersonal safety  behaviour programs  anti-bullying  counseling

 schools in our neighborhoods  ability to get child to school  lots of notice for date/time changes – respect my schedule  regular school schedule – not frequent early dismissals  If professional development / collaboration / report card writing is important, do not fund it on backs of parents  And please don’t respond to these concerns with “we aren’t a daycare facility”

 we hear "smaller class size" quite a lot - what does this actually mean?  Is it a class size of X for grade Y, or should it be adjusted based on individual students within the class?  Why are average class sizes for grades 4-7 greater than in high school?  Most parental concern heard is around intermediate class sizes – district average 26.5 vs. provincial average 25.4, grades 8-12 average 23.3  Is “class size” an appropriate metric? How does it change with 21 st century / personalized learning, and other changes?

 What can we substitute for IEP?  Workload rating per student? Modifications required, annoying parents?  Supportive of working things so that there isn’t that labeling required in order to receive support  Avoid burning out district employees in the process  One question that seems to be brought up by parents is around educational assistants, and how they can best be used in and out of classrooms  Costs, placement, working collaboratively with teachers – how does it all work?

 Have heard parent frustrations over having to wait for formal evaluations  don’t wait for a diagnosis before intensive support – we recognize that is difficult  Support for parents through this process  some parents are intimidated, or feel they don’t get heard, or are in total denial  What other options do we have when funding doesn’t keep up with current methods of dealing with students with specific needs?

 All our children should have access to these:  Librarians / learning commons facilitators  Resource Teachers  Art  Music  Drama  Technical education  How can this work with all our schools?

 One of most important issues is the quality of the teaching that our children receive  Dollars spent on evaluating teachers - as long as there is a result to this evaluation - is being spent to the benefit of students  Effective professional development is to the benefit of students  What are appropriate metrics?  There is a cost to evaluation and development – and huge benefits

 How are resources aligned to need across the district?  There does need to be a genuine and respectful conversation about how choice in school and programs may impact equitable access to resources  In looking at class size numbers in various schools, we see that classes in the primary project (tier 1) schools are built considerably smaller than in other schools, showing more funding going to these schools  We fully agree that our vulnerable students need to be supported  How is this balanced against needs of vulnerable students in other schools?  If it is better for vulnerable students to have smaller class sizes, how can this be best handled equitably across the district?

 Some common parent comments:  How can bussing work with choice programs?  Example - during original Aboriginal choice school discussions, transportation was identified as a major financial concern  How can courtesy bussing work – is there an option to have some paid bussing?  Some of this may fall into that discussion on equity within the district

 Concerns expressed over how we may be failing our secondary school students who require distributed learning in order to meet their goals  In various secondary schools, we have seen minimum class sizes not met, leading students to distributed learning classes  these distributed learning classes do not have the same achievement level as the rest of the district  It is time to invest in this, especially as we continue to see secondary school populations declining over the next number of years

 We need to be smart about this, and we can’t have everything – but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do anything  Communications with parents – technology to assist in this is severely lacking  SD57 web technology lacking

 Our children need capable and loving adults surrounding them to help guide them into their future  Money helps, but people are pivotal