Jan. 05, 2011 - Issue #794 : Year in Review 2010
Issues
Better luck next time
Recent provincial education review needs resources to deliver
As provincial consultations go, the process was better than most. It was co-chaired by MLA Jeff Johnson and high school teacher Brent McDonough, and made a genuine effort to consult not only with all those folks directly involved in our education system, but also with the public at large through a series of workshops and dialogues and on-line conversations and questionnaires.
The committee's report was released publicly last June, and was quickly followed by the release of a discussion paper by the minister entitled Inspiring Action. In his foreword to the discussion paper, Minister Hancock says that "Inspiring Education was about dreaming the dream, and Inspiring Action is about what we all must do to make this dream a reality." Inspiring Action contains the policy directions that Hancock feels will be necessary to make the vision of Inspiring Education a reality. The ultimate goal is a re-write of Alberta's School Act, and the introduction of a series of regulations to fill out the necessary policies.
Both documents are full of big picture values and ideas which reflect both current research on pedagogy and the expressed wishes of Albertans vis a vis their education system. Built around concepts like student-centred learning, shared responsibility, accountability and transparency, an increased role for schools in the community, wrap-around services for students, effective use of technology, and greater flexibility, it is difficult to imagine anyone opposing the ideas and directions identified by the process thus far.
There are, however, two significant concerns about where the process goes from here. This government has a history of approving vague, big-picture legislation that sounds fabulous, then letting the specifics be filled out through regulations in council. Given Alberta's current political reality, where the governing party is feeling significant pressure from its right flank as a result of the Wildrose Alliance's growing popularity, having broad legislation without specifics could be dangerous, and the results contrary to the wishes of most Albertans.
Within this context: the concept of student-centred learning could be used to justify a voucher system for education, the concept of shared responsibility could result in more public-private partnerships, contracting out of services, and off-loading to community groups; an increased focus on technology could result in a greater corporate presence in the classroom; and as we know from our experience with health care, the idea of flexibility could actually mean greater funding for private schools and the introduction of new service providers to the system.
Minister Hancock has himself stated that most of what's in the documents could be accomplished within the parameters of the existing School Act. If that's the case, then why risk a re-write?
The greater concern, however, is that, historically, this government has not shown itself to have the political will to invest the resources necessary to meet the current targets and desired outcomes of the education system. It is telling, for example, that at the exact same time that these two documents were being released, the government was telling school boards that there was no money to cover the negotiated increase in salaries for this year, and cutting programs which provided critical funding to mandated areas like phys ed and art.
We've been through this before with the 2003 Learning Commission, where there has been little to no action on any of the recommendations which actually required an infusion of funding from the government.
Although the minister has said throughout the process that this shouldn't be about funding or staffing or salaries, the reality is that we cannot get there from here without a commitment to adequate, stable and predictable funding from the government.
Teachers and other staff are already stretched beyond thin and facing greater cutbacks and budgetary restrictions every day. How do we move toward concepts like student-centred learning without adequately funding proper student-teacher ratios and support staff? How do we increase the role of school buildings in the community when school boards are being forced to close community schools and community groups are currently shut out of P3 schools? How do we implement wrap-around services in a province where social services, health care and community supports have been chronically underfunded since at least 1993? How do we maximize the effective use of technology in the classroom if schools are already forced to fundraise, organize casinos, and beg corporations for donations in order to get computers and smart boards today?
What confidence can we have that this government will take any positive steps on the policy directions in Inspiring Action given its current $5 billion deficit, its vow to hold the line on expenditures, and the single focus of the finance minister on balancing the books by dealing only with the expense side of the balance sheet?
In the end, despite the best intentions of the minister, the quality of the consultation process and the desirability of the vision, nothing will change unless the government can guarantee that it will provide the resources necessary to make both the vision and spirit of Inspiring Education a reality, and history shows that is not likely to happen. Perhaps we'll have better luck the next time they undertake this kind of process. V
Ricardo Acuña is the executive director of the Parkland Institute, a non-partisan public policy research institute housed at the University of Alberta. vueweekly.com comments: powered by Disqus
Privacy Policy:
Vue respects your privacy. We will not forward your personal information to any other organization except as required by law, and will use your e-mail address only to respond to your comments. We reserve the right to edit and remove comments for length, clarity and/or if they are illegal or inappropriate. Your email address is never shown to visitors to vueweekly.com. Read the whole policy at: http://vueweekly.com/privacy
Comments policy
Comments go online directly without first being seen or reviewed by editors at Vue. Don't personally attack people, don't be defamatory, don't be spam-atory, don't hawk your band, don't pretend to be someone else, be clear, be on topic, be nice. Read our extended comments policy here. »
We use Disqus for our comments system. What's that all about?
We found that managing the comment community at Vue was easier to do with a system like Disqus. If this isn't straightforward to you, get help here.