At top, vice-principal Tracy Harrington and principal Marcus Toneatto eagerly anticipate the new 400-seat auditorium at Southern Okanagan Secondary School. Above, director of facilities Mitch Van Aller takes trustees on a tour of the rebuild project.
Lyonel Doherty photos
Under the proposal for collaboration time, students would be dismissed an hour early every second week. This would impact students like Parmvir Sidhu from Oliver Elementary School.
Lyonel Doherty photo
A school district proposal to dismiss students one hour early twice a month is not sitting well with some parents.
The plan, to give teachers and administrators “collaboration time,” drew fire from mothers and fathers at last week’s public meeting at the board office.
“This is a huge source of concern,” said Keremeos mother Jade Jager, noting the idea of taking time away from students is contrary to learning. She also noted it’s a big inconvenience to working parents.
But board officials assured moms and dads that students would still be getting the legislated amount of instructional time.
Board chair Marieze Tarr said the proposal is a request from teachers and administrators, whose “voices are getting louder” for inquiry (collaboration) time embedded into the school day. This collaboration time will be utilized to improve student success by identifying struggling learners and implementing strategies to address these problems.
However, to accommodate this approach, students would be dismissed a total of two hours early every month.
Tarr acknowledged this will be inconvenient to some parents. “We want what’s best for the kids. Sometimes you have to give a little to get something.”
Osoyoos school trustee June Harrington said the point is they want to address specific issues in order to improve learning situations for students.
But Cory Mills from Oliver raised a concern about instructional time taken away from special needs students.
Assistant superintendent Jim Insley said students at Oliver Elementary and Southern Okanagan Secondary will lose up to five minutes of instructional time per day. Tuc-el-Nuit’s instructional time will stay the same; the school will add minutes to allow for inquiry time. “For all schools, instructional time will be at or above the minimum required by legislation in BC,” Insley said.
Some parents at the meeting asked why teachers and administrators can’t conduct their inquiry time after school (without sending kids home early).
Osoyoos teacher Sylvia Slater said many educators do prep time after school, and she questioned how many more hours are educators expected to put into the job.
She also pointed out that some teachers coach after school as well.
Fellow educator Natasha Schroeter said sometimes teachers work until 9 or 10 pm during the week. “We want to make student learning situations better . . . it’s about the kids.”
Oliver parent Karen Somerville expressed a concern about the impact this proposal will have on busing schedules. Another parent, Sandra Oldfield, suggested the proposal be on a trial basis, and that the board demonstrate (and report) to parents how beneficial it really is.
A concern was also raised about hundreds of businesses having to make accommodations for their employees who have to leave work in order to pick up their children.
Another parent said students are attending school less and less, so it should be up to teachers to find two hours a month for collaboration time without interrupting pupils’ learning.
School trustee Sam Hancheroff said a good example of inquiry time was demonstrated recently when the decision was made to provide Grade 6 and 7 students with an opportunity to explore trades at Southern Okanagan Secondary School.
If implemented, the board will look at the results after a year’s time, Tarr said. She noted the issue will likely be debated at the next board meeting in April.
