Six of the seven school board trustees came of OSS to hear from the Osoyoos community about the potential school closings. From left are Rob Zandee, Rachel Allenbrand, Debbie Marten, June Harrington, Myrna Coates and Chair Marieze Tarr. Missing was Sam Hancheroff. (Richard McGuire photo)
Some Osoyoos town councillors are convinced after a testy meeting with School District 53 representatives that trustees have already made a decision to close an Osoyoos school.
The closed meeting between council and the school district took place last Tuesday before a public consultation meeting that drew about 1,000 Osoyoos residents to the gymnasium at Osoyoos Secondary School (OSS).
“I’m not certain there was a lot of openness for solutions,” said Coun. Carol Youngberg. “The general feeling for me was that prior to the open (public) meeting, they had come to us with some foregone conclusions. It just seemed to me that they came to the meeting completely prepared to show us how we could move forward with their decision.”
Coun. Mike Campol reached a similar conclusion, also saying it was “disingenuous” and “nonsense” for Marieze Tarr, school board chair, to suggest there was prior consultation with the town.
“For me it was a frustrating meeting,” said Campol. “The other thing that frustrated me was it looked like they came to a conclusion and then decided after the fact how to come to that conclusion.”
Trustees, however, insist that their minds are open and they are interested in finding solutions. They expressed a willingness to meet with council again.
“Everyone had their turn to say how disappointed they are in the school board that we are considering this,” Tarr said of the meeting with council. “But now let’s work together and find some solutions.”
She also insisted she has been trying for the past five years to bring the message to council about the situation the school district faces with declining enrolment.
Council members insist they need more time to find a solution.
The school board could make a decision to close OSS or Osoyoos Elementary School as early as April 6.
“You can’t come up with solutions and get it all in place in six weeks,” said Mayor Sue McKortoff, adding that she hopes the board will give it at least another year to allow time to find solutions.
McKortoff also disputed the claim that council had been consulted saying she “didn’t see any red flags” in previous talks with trustees.
Oliver Trustee Rob Zandee, however, cast doubt on whether the board will give more time.
“I’ve been around for a while and the same arguments were made in 2005, 2010, 2013,” he said. “We need more time, we need more time, we need more time. We’re now at a decade. The situation hasn’t got better and the board is no longer in the situation it was then by any stretch of the imagination.”
Zandee allowed that it’s possible the board could give more time, saying he doesn’t know how other trustees will vote.
Trustees and councillors all agreed that the public meeting brought out the passionate support in the community for Osoyoos schools.
Opinions differed, however, about whether solutions proposed at the meeting are practical.
Tarr said the board and school district staff will be looking at the cost-saving ideas that were raised at the public meeting, but she cast doubt on each of the main ones.
These, she said, included implementing a four-day school week, cutting administrative costs, eliminating the network leaders program and attracting international students.
A four-day school week would require a separate consultation of the entire district, she said, and could not be in place for the next school year.
Only two districts in the province have implemented this, she said, and Superintendent Bev Young has never advised the district to switch to four days, she added.
“I want to try to do what’s best for all children in our district,” said Tarr. “I am very concerned about what will happen to vulnerable children if we move to a four-day school week because those children are at risk. That means they only are in an intellectual environment four days.”
Tarr is also not optimistic that major cost savings can be achieved with administration cuts.
School districts are advised to spend between three and six per cent of their budgets on administration, she said. SD53 is near the bottom at just four per cent.
“It’s not like we are extravagant and that we can cut a lot of money,” she said, acknowledging that it might be possible to reduce administration costs to the three-per-cent minimum. “Unfortunately, the kind of cuts we are going to have to make is going to have to be things that affect the classroom now.”
The Network Leaders program was something that several public speakers suggested could be cut, with Osoyoos resident Robin Stille claiming its cost is $230,000 a year when both the program costs and teachers’ wages for time spent are taken into account.
This program is based on the work of educational researchers Judy Halbert and Linda Kaser, and involves “spirals of inquiry” in which teachers evaluate the effectiveness of their teaching in stages.
Tarr said she thinks the costs of the program aren’t as high as were stated at the meeting and she said it’s an important part of the 21st century learning experience.
“We believe that our network leaders are building a capacity in our school district,” said Tarr. “The network program is responsible for implementing new ideas and new initiatives in education in our classrooms. I think everyone wants our education system to move with the times and not to stagnate.”
She also said the idea of attracting international students was previously tried and it ended up costing the school district rather than bringing in revenue.
The school district couldn’t find enough housing for homestays, she said.
There are also costs including administrative time required to recruit students from abroad and many international students aren’t interested in coming to smaller communities, she added.
Tarr said the YouLearn.ca budget is being looked at as are other cost savings suggested at the public meeting.
“It’s very easy when somebody can stand up and throw a bunch of numbers out, but people like that don’t have to be accountable,” she said. “We actually have to be accountable for every dollar that we spend in the budget and everything is costed out.”
Zandee, the Oliver trustee, said that cuts have largely been made outside the classroom over the past five or six years.
“We’re now at a point where they’re going to be made within the class,” he said.
It costs the same to run a class with 14 students as it does with 25, he said, noting that the province is asking school districts to find operational efficiencies, which means having full classes.
The other Oliver trustee, Rachel Allenbrand, said she found the public meeting “pretty intense” and said she, as a parent of three, was moved by some of the personal stories about how families would be affected by the closures.
“The government of B.C. is not doing their job in providing proper education (funding) for the entire province,” Allenbrand said. “We’re not the only district with this issue at all.”
She noted that Education Minister Mike Bernier visited the district in December, but other districts are also saying they need more money, and he said his funds are limited.
“It’s so frustrating,” she said.
Campol said he has some sympathy for the position the trustees face and he doesn’t think the personal attacks some received at the public meeting were helpful.
“These people are elected and we may not agree with the conclusion they came to, but we have to understand the job they are facing is unreasonable,” he said. “To have trustees forced to balance an impossible budget or not have their positions anymore, I think is unreasonable. It’s a systemic problem.”
Mayor McKortoff pointed out that when the school district’s budget is $24 million a year, it should be possible for a structured working committee to find $500,000 in savings.
Coun. Youngberg said the school district should analyze each school separately to see where the deficit comes from.
She noted that Osoyoos pays the most in education taxes, but Oliver has seen the largest declines in enrolment and its high school was built beyond what was needed.
“So now everybody is having to pick up that deficit,” she said. “It’s also frustrating when they come to us and talk about Osoyoos enrolment declining. I don’t think so.”
Councillor Jim King said the school district’s projected structural deficit for 2017 is $1.4 million and the board hasn’t said how it will address this.
“They have a sort of Band-Aid solution for one year and they really don’t have a three-year or five-year long-term solution,” King said.
Closing the school could cause families to leave the area, he added.
“This would actually hurt the school district down the road because that would mean even less children,” King said.
RICHARD McGUIRE
Osoyoos Times
School board chair and Osoyoos Trustee Marieze Tarr opened the meeting. She told the audience she didn’t vote on Jan. 13 motions to start the process to close Osoyoos schools, because she was chairing the meeting and the chair doesn’t vote except to break a tie. She said if she had voted, she would have opposed the motions. (Richard McGuire photo)
Mayor Sue McKortoff and Councillor Mike Campol listen intently to a presentation by school district officials explaining the rationale for looking at closing one of the Osoyoos schools. McKortoff later got up to express strong opposition to the closures. (Richard McGuire photo)
