Developments on the legal front

ASBA hires new lawyer
Join us in welcoming Deborah McGuire to the ASBA legal department. Deborah comes to us from the Federal Department of Justice, Tax litigation.  Prior to that, she was with Alberta Education, Legislative Services and Alberta Justice, Civil Litigation.  She has been a lawyer for 10 years.

New legal newsletter/video conference sessions launched
The ASBA will be offering a suite of new services aimed at providing more education and information on the legal side – beyond the excellent direct service provided by the ASBA legal department.  The association is launching a new for-subscription legal newsletter. Vis à vis will provide current news about legal developments in plain language for educators. Beyond offering the “what” of the legal development, the newsletters’ authors will strive to identify the “so what” for school boards.

Another new initiative will see the ASBA offer regular video conferences focused on legal issues. Internet use policies will be the focus of the first session which will take place from noon to 1:30 p.m. on June 17. Watch for a complimentary copy of the vis à vis legal newsletter and information about the June 17 video conference to be e-mailed to your jurisdiction office shortly.

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ATA to debate motion calling on boards
to run deficits and not lay off teachers

Teachers will meet in Calgary over the long weekend for the Alberta Teachers’ Association annual meeting. Up for debate are two motions related to the unfunded salary increases for teachers.
The first motion urges school boards to act on Education Minister Dave Hancock’s expectation that they use reserves or run a deficit to maintain current staffing levels. The second motion urges the provincial government to honour Premier Stelmach’s commitment to fully fund school boards to cover teacher salary increases for 2010 and 2011 without reducing the commitment to the Class Size Initiative.

When asked about these motions ASBA President Heather Welwood is saying: “We’re pleased to see the ATA calling on the government to fund its commitment to the deal the government struck with the provincial ATA. Our board of directors passed a similar motion on May 14. As for the motion calling on school boards to maintain current staffing levels – without the government coming through with the promised money it will be hard for school boards to act on the ATA’s suggestion that we avoid laying off staff.  If we think of a school system as a family; when the savings dry up do we ask the whole family to cut back or do we run up our credit cards and hope the money will come from somewhere?”

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What will school boards decide at 2010 SGM?

Here are some of the key issues school boards will consider at the Spring General Meeting:

• Proposed ASBA budget for 2010-11
• Motion calling on the provincial government to honor its commitment to fully fund the increases in teacher compensation called for in the November 2007 Alberta Government- Alberta Teachers' Association Memorandum of Understanding
• Progress report: Development of a communications protocol/guiding principles for school boards operating schools within another board's boundary
• Changes to the criteria for eligibility to serve in ASBA leadership positions
• Call to drop the 50 per cent weighting of diploma exam results to 30 per cent when calculating students' final marks
• Reaffirmation of ASBA policy calling for the Alberta Teachers’ Association’s bargaining function to be separated from its professional function

The deadline for online registration is May 28, 2010. As of May 20, 282 people have registered for the Spring General Meeting.

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Alberta boosts high school completion rates: Stats Canada report

According to Statistics Canada’s Youth in Transition Survey, Alberta is making progress on the high school completion front.  The Youth in Transition Survey followed a cohort of young Canadians aged 18 to 20 in 1999, until 2007, when they reached 26 to 28 years of age. 

According to an April 2010 fact sheet, in 1999 Alberta had one of the highest dropout rates in Canada at 20.2 per cent. By 2007, 60 per cent of these dropouts had completed high school.

According to a May 3 Globe and Mail editorial, Alberta has made steady progress on its graduation rates by making it a policy focus. This includes a wide variety of ways to attract students back to school, such as personalized learning, dual credits with apprenticeship programs and mentorships. Read the full report.

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May 25 video conference to get school board feedback re draft protocol/guiding principles for school boards operating schools outside their boundaries

Plan to participate in a May 25 video conference discussing the first draft of a communications protocol and guiding principles for school boards operating schools outside their boundaries. Hosted by the task force drafting the documents: consultant Steve Cymbol; Rick Hayes, Alberta Education and Suzanne Lundrigan, ASBA Director of Communications, the video conference will get school boards' reactions to the draft documents circulated May 17. The video conference runs from 12 p.m. to 2 p.m. on May 25th. Dial-in information has been circulated. For more information contact Bobbie Garner.

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Minister tweets release dates for key reports

According to a May 14 “tweet” from Minister of Education Dave Hancock the Inspiring Education report will be released June 2 and the Setting the Direction report will be issued June 11.  The June 2 release of the Inspiring Education report is excellent timing for the ASBA Spring General Meeting because Jim Gibbons, who served on the Inspiring Education Steering Committee, will be speaking about the report – with a focus on school board governance. And for those curious about tweeting – join another speaker Ken Chapman who will be talking about governance in cyberspace.

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What are Janice Sarich’s duties?

Transportation, engaging newcomers to Canada in education and using schools between 3 and 6 p.m. are among the issues Education Minister Dave Hancock has asked Parliamentary Assistant Janice Sarich to tackle. He outlined his expectations in an April 7 memo to Sarich.

• Transportation: promising practices
  As a subset of the School Act review and the subsequent review of regulations to the School Act, research promising practices for student transportation from other jurisdictions to design enabling and non-encumbering regulatory and policy frameworks for the safe transportation of students in Alberta. This initiative will involve engagement with the Ministry of Transportation as traffic safety falls under the purview of that department. Any new regulatory or policy framework must respect the flexibility and autonomy of local decision makers.
• Engage newcomers to Canada
  Engage newcomers to Canada in a discussion about the value of education to individuals, communities, and greater society. Work with new Canadians to foster a greater understanding of their aspirations, hopes, and concerns in the pursuit of better enabling new immigrants of school age to participate fully in and ultimately complete their ECS-12 education and to adjust and contribute fully to Alberta society.

• Explore use of schools between 3 and 6 p.m.
  In support of government’s global priority to foster safe communities and healthier citizens, examine the use of school infrastructure to focus on maximizing the use of school facilities for children and youth co-curricular programming between the ‘critical hours’ of 3pm and 6pm. This work will take into consideration the redesign of Education’s wellness framework and work in other ministries to promote physical activity, fitness, and wellness amongst our young citizens, as well as findings from the successes and failures of Education’s policy on daily physical activity.

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School act on hold?

From the April 23 edition of Insight into Government
“School Act may be on hold.....” writes Mark Lisac in the April 23 edition of Insight into Government. “A revised School Act has been in the works for several months but will likely not be introduced in the legislature’s fall sitting. A new health law comes first. One reason for having a short spring sitting was to allow time for public consultations. That includes work led by Fred Horne (PC–Edmonton-Rutherford) on a new Alberta Health Act. His report is due by Sept. 30. Education Minister Dave Hancock would prefer not to have the extensive and important School Act rewrite being debated at the same time as the health law.

Conservative MLAs will make the final decision on timing. One argument in favour of delaying the School Act rewrite is that nothing of a similar scale is on the horizon for the spring sitting in 2011. The higher priority for health makes it clear where the government feels the strongest political pressure. However, a delay of the School Act rewrite also raises questions about whether Conservative MLAs are eager to accept all the proposed changes coming out of the Education Department. The project sounded more urgent during talks with school boards last fall. Hancock hopes to have the report on his Inspiring Education project reviewed by Conservative MLAs on the cabinet policy committee on education in the next several days. It could be released in about two weeks. Plans to change special needs education are also a year off now.

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Nova Scotia school boards can discipline naughty trustees

Nova Scotia school boards now have the authority to discipline individual trustees as a result of changes to the Nova Scotia Education Act. Introduced in February, the amendments clarify the minister of education's authority when responding to trustee conduct.

The new legislation will see trustees take an oath of office agreeing to adhere to a provincially prescribed code of ethics. Individual school boards may add elements to the code of ethics as long as they include the standard items.

Other provisions include:

• setting standard procedures for conducting meetings
• trustees must inform the chair in advance if they wish to
  leave a meeting, to ensure the board has the proper quorum
• trustees are prohibited from disclosing confidential information

Under the new legislation, school boards now have the authority to censure trustees for violating the board's code of ethics, including suspending a trustee for one to three months or recommending the minister vacate the trustee’s seat. A censured trustee does have the right to an appeal.

As in Alberta, Nova Scotia’s minister of education retains the ability to replace an entire board. Alberta school boards do not have the ability to suspend a trustee. 

The new legislation also sets out how vacancies will be filled. Seats that become vacant less than six months before a school board election will remain vacant pending the election. Seats that become vacant six months to two years before a school board election will be filled by an individual appointed by the minister of education, in consultation with the school board. Special elections will be called to fill vacancies that occur more than two years before a school board election.

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What's new @www.asba.ab.ca

ASBA strategic plan

Progress report: May 2010 (PDF–175K)

Policies and Bylaws

Addendum: Policy clean-up for 2010 SGM (PDF–146K)

Agenda Board of Directors

May 13-14 (PDF–91K)

Highlights Board of Directors

May 13-14 (PDF–91K)

Minutes Board of Directors

April 16 (PDF–92K)

Conflict isn't a dirty word...

Read this article (PDF–124K) in the May 2010 edition of Communications Now outlining how to make conflict work for you. See this index for a listing of previous Communication Now articles.

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In the news...

We have more than 50 articles in our education in the news archive.
Check them out here:

Fort McMurray Public in “very grave place”– possible $3.4 million deficit 2010-11

Calgary Catholic faces deficit for first time in 125 years

No raises for Rocky View support staff in bid to save jobs
Alberta Ed.’s September claw back  puts Horizon School Division into the red

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