I hope that you are as excited as I am about the extra $266,000 in funding that SD67 will be receiving for next year.
Combined with the reduction in teacher’s pension payments, the amount of additional funding that has been made available to SD67 since the decision to close Trout Creek on March 9 is now over $800,000. Additionally, your secretary treasurer is projecting a $400,000 operations surplus from this year. There is clearly money available to keep Trout Creek open for at least one more year.
The decision to close Trout Creek elementary school has been shrouded in controversy and misinformation from day one.
The closure of Trout Creek Elementary School and reconfiguration of Summerland schools is very different from the closure of West Bench and McNicoll. This impacts every school in Summerland and is clearly detrimental to education in Summerland.
I understand the need to get the district footprint in closer alignment to the enrollment, but that should not be done at the expense of providing the best education possible for our children. There have been so many excellent ideas presented that could provide sustainable solutions without degrading the quality of education for students in Summerland. These ideas need time and consideration, and now, with the new funding, you have the ability to post-pone making changes in Summerland for a year so that these ideas can be explored.
There has been talk about requiring “sustainable funding” in order to keep schools open, however, I think there is a misunderstanding of what the residents of Summerland expect. Nobody is arguing that everything should stay the same in Summerland for eternity. We understand that something needs to be done to save money or increase enrollment in Summerland; this have been proven by the numerous proposals that have been put forward over the past number of months.
We are only asking to keep things the way they are in Summerland for one year in order to come up with a solution that will accomplish the goals of SD67 without putting more small children on buses and forcing Summerland into a corner where is can not grow. One extra year does not need sustainable funding, it needs a one time amount of $360,000. Fortunately, this can be covered by the new funding of $266,000 and the projected surplus of $400,000.
There are no more excuses. Between the new $266,000 and the projected surplus of $400,000 there is more than enough money to delay the closure of Trout Creek for one year. There are so many potential solutions on the table: The Montessori program of choice bringing new students into SD67, shared services with District of Summerland to reduce operational expenses in Summerland schools, re-configuration, but with both Giant’s Head and Trout Creek as reasonably sized K-3 schools. This keeps community schools for our youngest students and allows Summerland room to grow while saving over $300,000.
With everything that is going on with the Vancouver School Board, education is going to be an incredibly hot topic in the upcoming provincial election. At this time next year, the funding landscape could be dramatically different. In addition, there will be updated data from the 2016 census. With new enrollment projections on the horizon and possible political change, it is the wrong time to be making decisions that will so negatively impact Summerland.
Fortunately, the money has become available so the school board can delay any changes in Summerland for one year. All they need to do, immediately, is delay the closure date to June 30, 2017. This will allow time to work with the community and investigate the proposed alternatives.
Why did trustees run for public office if not to ensure that students in Summerland receive the best possible public education? They have the opportunity to fulfill that mandate like never before. They should both be fighting tooth and nail to postpone the closure of Trout Creek because there are better options for education in Summerland; we just need time to figure out what will work best.
It is never too late to do the right thing, so please step up and do it!
Mike Pleasance
Summerland