Public Education in Edmonton

The Edmonton Public School Board is closing schools on a sector by sector basis using a public relations firm to facilitate ‘dialogue’. There are unanswered questions regarding the actual amount of ‘surplus’ space at EPSB schools and the reasons that EPSB is losing a significant number of students to other districts.

Capital Region Districts honoured with the Education Leadership Recognition Awards to celebrate significant improvement and/or very high achievement.

A growing number of students are skipping the traditional classroom and being educated on-line. According to one student, “it is not all that different”. A report states: ”The Centre for Learning is the biggest school in Okotoks, but it doesn’t have a single student walk through their doors on a typical day. The Centre for Learning has 2,500 full and part time students, compared to five years ago when it only had 1,300 students. [The principal] said the enrollment has grown over this time as the centre expanded its course offerings and improved on their delivery.”

An editorial without (many) words…

Teaching by example: A school with an arts, science and technology focus that uses recycled and local materials and has solar walls, geothermal heating. It uses less energy by recycling water and having natural lighting. Its not just a school that is friendly the the environment. It is friendly to hard working, tired parents as it will also include a day-care centre with room for 40 preschoolers. “This would not have been possible without the incredible advocacy of the school board, the director of education, the administration, but most importantly, you, the people.…That's democracy and the value of what will be placed in this facility.“

EPSB’s sector approach to closing schools raises questions. Why is the closure process focusing on the poorest and weakest neighborhoods when more than 50% of Edmonton Public School Board schools have declining enrollment? Is there a ‘bigger’ problem?

A Harvard education researcher and author of Beyond the Bake Sale says: “I want families to push. I want them to say, ‘This is what I expect.’”

“During the first morning session Thursday, classes from Edmonton, Calgary, Ohio and New York took turns asking and answering questions with the dozen Guatemalan students about school, work and life.”

“The whole structure of Education is shifting between our feet.”