In recent months we have spent a good deal of time looking at school closures and in the past few weeks have decided to close schools and alternate programs in an effort to save money and gain the flexibility to avoid some of the cuts to programs and services being forced on us by the current financial situation.
Most of the cuts look innocent as they get at indirect services such as professional development, LAC and administration. These cuts however will place more burden on the front line teachers and the few remaining admin folks. Both of these effects will reduce the ability of the District to help all our kids learn, to plan properly and to manage the limited resources well.
There is not much time left to properly consider all the proposed cuts and I do not have the knowledge that would enable me to assess the impacts on students, staff and teachers for most of the specific proposals. For that we must all rely on the professionals to explain the impact.
What I will speak about are some general concerns and thoughts about how to approach this complex decision under three headings: Meaningful comparison, Erosion at the margins and Capacity to adapt.
Meaningful Comparison
My first recommendation is to ensure you take the time to compare the options in terms of their actual impact on students. If we look at the proposal document and at the budget discussions so far we have concentrated a lot on abstract numbers (FTE's etc.) and I think this makes weighing the options virtually impossible. We see a number and think we could cut that, but can we? Few people know what the numbers mean, and in many cases what the current #'s are and what they mean. What is needed for each proposed cut is for you as trustees to ask the questions that will let you understand the impact the changes would have on the ground to kids in the schools. Not as an aggregate number in total for the district, or as a change from last year. What does it take to deliver those services today, what is the demand for the service and what would kids that require those services find they would get next year?
In particular, we are concerned about the significant cuts and reorganization of student services included in "instructional practices #2" there are a lot of different student supports captured within that one recommendation. Student Services have been hit, time & time again and it does affect the classroom learning of all children. This one item needs to be looked at deeply to understand the specific impacts of cuts to the different services rather than generically grouping them all in under one big "student services" line item.
In order to ensure that people really understand the gravity of the cuts and can make a meaningful comparison between the options it is essential that the numbers and cuts be presented in a way that is meaningful to the community. Every option should be presented in some form of "this cut (example) would look like this (example) at the district, school, and/or classroom level...." The key is to not shy away from the real impact of what effect the cuts have on students, staff, and community at all levels but to capture those impacts so tradeoffs can be weighed in understandable language that relates to the everyday experience of parents, staff, teachers and most importantly, students.
Eroding the margins
Many of the proposed cuts could impact each schools capacity to respond to the individual needs of students especially those that are on the margins of the normal system. There will likely still be support and time for students that are failing to fit into the regular program to get them back into the system. But I am concerned for students that are struggling, the cuts will likely reduce teacher, staff and administration time needed to identify and assist students struggling to stay with the regular program and provide suitable early intervention to meet their needs before a struggle results in failure. Our recommendation is that Trustees carefully consider the needs of students on the margins for a responsive, adaptable school system and ensure that despite any cuts we continue to enable schools to identify struggling students and apply school and district resources to help those students regain a stable position in the school system.
School Plans typically identify a schools strategy to improve reading, writing, and math through intervention to assist marginally performing students using a variety of methods but the practicality of this depends on anticipated cuts. Trustees should look to school plans for guidance as to the specific areas where the district needs to focus secondary services.
Capacity to adapt
The third important factor is to relate the options taken today to the effects we will feel tomorrow as we look ahead to future planning and our resulting ability to stay the course versus reacting to every financial or policy bump along the way.
North Van school district is a place of constant change. Between declining enrolment, new alternative programs, all-day K, new ministry guidelines, school closures etc. the district needs to respond to many changes now and into the future. My concern is that by focusing all resources on individual schools and delivering education only for today that the district will lose the institutional memory, shared learning and common resources needed to continue to adapt, develop, maintain, and support our staff, teachers, curriculum etc. and thereby maintain high quality education in North Vancouver. Our recommendation is that Trustees carefully consider cuts to district support to make sure that any short-term cuts do not eliminate the districts ability to adapt our teaching to the long-term needs of students.
For example cuts to professional development may be expedient for a year or two but this could be catastrophic if allowed to continue for too long resulting in lost capacity and lost morale. We should be careful to have a plan to ensure we maintain the practices and resources needed to keep North Van Schools strong.
Conclusion
In conclusion, we are concerned that given the short time for discussion cuts may be made without meaningful comparison of the impacts, especially cuts that erode supports for struggling students and eliminate the districts capacity to adapt to change. But we are also confident that as trustees you will do your due diligence and we encourage you to make sure that before you make cuts you know what those people do, why that service is needed today, who will be impacted, how they will be impacted today and tomorrow and what staff, students and parents will need to do (if anything) to reduce that impact.
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