I’ve been watching the New Westminster SD#40 financial crisis news closely for what we can learn from it. It seems to be a bizarre case of mismanagement and dysfunctionality which I hope is not typical of other school districts. The rest of the 59 boards should be checked out according to what we have learned from SD#40’s problems.

I have written to Deputy Minister James Gorman and my MLA and asked my MLA to forward my concerns to Education Minister Shirley Bond as I could not find an email for her. Below is a copy of my email to Gorman:

Dear Mr. Gorman:

I pass on a list of reforms I feel are indicated as a result of recent publicity about SD#40 financial crisis.

Education reforms indicated from watching New Westminster SD#40 financial crisis -- $2million shortfall. See: “Cash-strapped school district asks management to teach, Dec 18/08, Vancouver Sun

I attach my complete comment to the online blog of Janet Steffenhagen’s The Report Card but a summary of reforms that should be considered are summarized here:

1. Need for data and transparency concerning breakdown of school board expenses regarding salaries and benefits: a) teachers vs administrators; b) salaries for teachers vs benefits; c) salaries for administrators vs benefits; d) pie charts would aid understanding.
2. Business enterprises of school boards should cease, whether in China or elsewhere. The School Act needs to disallow this.
3. Administrative staffs need to be pared down.
4. Accountability for poor decision-making should be followed through with appropriate disincentives and insights gained. Costs and waste should apply to the divisions responsible, not clawed-back from school needs.
5. Recruitment of international students should cease.
6. Conflict of interest requires legislative attention: educators should not be able to sit on school boards.
7. FSA results should be used to grade school boards as to their adequacy in teaching the basic skills.
8. School-based management with parents involved, or charter schools should be considered instead of centralized school board management.
9. A cheque registry system online should be legislated to enable transparency for public to track school board spending.

My full comment is below, called MISSION DRIFT IN BC EDUCATION.

MISSION DRIFT IN BC EDUCATION to The Report Card, Dec 19/08

This New Westminster story reminds me of the School Wars of the 80’s when restraint/recession hit and cutbacks were in progress. Mission drift was an issue, but it was not called that. We called it FAT AND FRILLS!

From the Province story, Sept 26/82…”school cutbacks: The debate rages on furiously: ‘Time to cut the fat and frills…Wading through the flood of protest against proposed reduction in the escalating costs of education, one has to conclude that in the minds of the protesters the purpose of the system is primarily to provide well-paid jobs for educators with maximum security, pensions, vacations and fringe benefits and secondarily to produce educated students”

What we call mission drift today was called “fat and frills” and securing educator priorities over the interests of students. The case of New Westminster SD #40 struggling with a $2million shortfall is a good exhibit to examine where this institution has so seriously gone so far off-track that one concerned parent is already calling for a forensic audit of finance and operations.

1. 87% of last year’s budget went to salaries and benefits. What is the breakdown here? In 1982 80 % of the education budget in BC went to salaries and benefits, with 64 % to teacher salaries. What are today’s percentages of salaries vs benefits? How many administrators/managers vs teachers? Has there been a creep toward more administration and more generous benefits over the years? I really understand pie charts; let’s see some on this question.

2. What are these non-school entities? What is this business company overseeing a school in China?? What kind of conscience lets boards go into these risky adventures on the backs of their intended publics, the young students of their own community? Why claw back from the schools instead of eliminating these “entities”? Too bad the School Act is derelict in its duty and mandate and actually allows this to happen.

3. Why are there superfluous staffs – managers – at head office that can be deployed to teach at the schools when substitute teachers are needed?

4. What about waste and mismanagement over the last few years? Shouldn’t these bad decision-makers be fired (asbestos scandal, retaining wall removal, cemetery decision…)? All this contributed to the “shortfall”. Who is accountable -- administration, trustees, special interest groups, or what?

5. Is there still active recruitment of international students to bump up income? With the global recession there is a falling off here so the budget needs adjustment. In my district, West Vancouver, where this is happening, I heard a trustee provide the flip solution: The parents will need to do more fund-raising.

6. What else am I missing…? Oh yes, double-dipping, while not illegal is quite unethical. And what about conflict of interest of trustees? Did I read correctly – “long-time trustee Michael Ewen”…is a “teacher who works in Surrey district”?

All this corruption I’m getting from the media, so I’m not making false accusations. Maybe we need a government appointed official trustee to take over the dysfunctional New Westminster district. Maybe we should abolish Boards of Education altogether and let the parents run their own schools. There are plenty of models where parent boards run schools efficiently and effectively, and they are reasonably independent of all these political shenanigans.

I think this oncoming recession and required belt tightening for public institutions is a blessing in disguise. If it exposes all this “fat and frills” and shows us how seriously off-course our public education system has drifted maybe our kids will stand a chance.

And this is where FSA’s (Fundamental Skills Assessments) come in really handy. Besides determining if each and every child is getting the basics we could rank the 60 Boards of Education as to their adequacy in providing the fundamentals in reading, writing, and mathematics.

We need some serious reforms in our education system and one place to start is by legislating online cheque registry of all expenditures by Boards of Education in BC as is done in many parts of the US.

Edited by Tunya Audain (12/20/08 09:18 AM)