Children living in foster homes who are wards of the provincial government will get extra support from their schools in a new Tri-City program to help them achieve their education goals.

School District 43 has approximately 100 children in government care spread out in 30 schools, according to the district’s director of instruction for student services.

Dave Taylor told the board of education Tuesday that these children have special needs, some of them have attended several schools — up to eight in one case he cited — and are vulnerable. Schools will appoint a teacher or a principal to monitor each student’s attendance, academic performance, and social and emotional well-being, and report their progress to school-based teams and the Ministry of Education.

Taylor said the process is not unlike what’s already in place for vulnerable or struggling students.

He said the policy has been discussed with principals and the Ministry of Children and Family Development, whose social workers act as guardians for the students, and said people are “enthusiastic” about the process, although there is no extra funding to carry it out.

The district is responding to an order from the Ministry of Education that schools appoint someone to oversee education planning, monitoring and achievement of children in care because they typically don’t do as well in school as other children.

But at least one school trustee admitted to being skeptical of the process, which appears to be downloading without appropriate funding attached.

Coquitlam trustee Brian Robinson, who has been a social worker, said the approach is too restrictive and some children may fall through the cracks because they are in temporary care, although they need help too.

“I think we are missing a lot of kids,” said Robinson, noting that children in care often find it difficult to trust adults because they switch homes and schools so often.

Coquitlam trustee Diane Sowden, herself a foster parent, agreed that some kids may be missing from the list of students to be monitored and expressed concern about lack of extra funding for the initiative.

“Is this something that’s being downloaded off of everyone’s desks?” Sowden asked.

Taylor said it won’t be difficult to monitor the children in care because processes are already in place to help them with school, and in fact, they may already be identified by their school as needing extra help. These students may also be the subject of a larger project the school district is undertaking to address the needs of vulnerable students, said SD43 superintendent Tom Grant.

“How do we reach all those kids who aren’t being successful?” asked Grant, adding that a bigger project will be announced in the coming months.

BUDGET INFO

School District 43 missed the deadline to present a brief on the 2010 provincial budget to the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services and will now make a submission online. It registered for an Oct. 16 meeting in Surrey but would have been number 21 on the speakers list.

Trustees decided to go with an online submission and will have a laundry list of concerns about education funding to itemize.

Among the issues are inequities in grants for vulnerable children, funding shortfalls because of higher costs, such as increased MSP premiums and wages, and the elimination of the annual facilities grant this year. The district has saved $2 million from last year’s grant and will put it towards health and safety priorities; all other maintenance will be postponed.

dstrandberg@tricitynews.com