Please, Education Minister, this is what we need here at the lake

The following letter to Education Minister Margaret MacDiarmid and the board of education for School District 79 was forwarded to the Gazette for publication.

As a long time resident and taxpayer in British Columbia and as a parent of school age children for over 20 years I am asking for the following:

1. Fully resourced, fully funded quality public education for all our children.

2. Open, accurate and consistent communication between the school board and our whole community.

3. Maintenance of all our current schools as well as new facilities as required.

4. The right to enroll at our own neighbourhood schools.

5. Improved busing.

6. Continuing to communicate to the board and provincial government the community expectation for a new school at the previous site of A.B. Greenwell School on Hammond Road.

Statements from MacDiarmid of “84 million more dollars than last year” and “more dollars than ever put into public education” are not only misleading, but do not even touch the realistic situation. 

There has been a zero increase to the transportation budget for several years, to name only one, even though maintenance of the buses, wages and of course the sky rocketing fuel costs have escalated.

The public school system has been bled to death with negligible improvements and only by robbing Peter to pay Paul.

The per capita funding formula along with the destruction of neighbourhood schools and school boundaries have added to your obvious privatization agenda by reducing, at all costs, enrolment.

There is absolutely no reason for a slightly and temporary lower enrolment to constitute a severe reduction in quality of education and resources.  The school taxes I pay have continued to increase and I want to know, apart from increases to administration costs, where this money has gone.

The recent recession is an absolutely ridiculous and convenient excuse to give for the deplorable learning conditions. 

For the last 10 years the province of B.C. has been flush in economy with more income taxes being paid by the huge amount of employment, yet public education has continuously been slaughtered.

When the economy was not doing as well in the late 1980s, there were not the disgraceful cuts and there were even regular extra-curricular activities like field trips that were not funded by parent advisory councils. Never mind the government expecting PACs to provide basic learning materials like library books.

Shame on the continuing dismantlement of public education by the Ministry of Education.  Many of us in Lake Cowichan and area have had enough of the nonsense and expect your ministry to step up to the plate and make a brave stand against this degradation. We expect a new school built immediately to replace A.B. Greenwell school on the same piece of property. 

The closure of this building was due to cuts to maintenance and planned neglect. Just the same as homeowners on the West Coast have to properly heat and ventilate and maintain their homes to prevent mould and damage, so does, believe it or not, the government need to properly maintain their schools and buildings.

Make the wrong that happened right again. Enough cuts and false promises.  This Ministry has an opportunity to make things right and has a huge opportunity to rectify all the long term damage done.

I want my taxes spent on quality, equally funded education so this generation and many to follow can be a fully, soundly educated group of people who will look after you and me as we enter old age.

I would hate to imagine the present lack of opportunity for a good public education, despite our excellent educators, producing young adults that will be running our province in the future.

Sincerely,

Jane Martin,

Lake Cowichan

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR