Teachers urge parents to get involved

As the 2008-09 school year comes to an end, teachers across B.C. are urging parents to start thinking about September and the challenges facing our public education system next year.

 School districts across the province are grappling with unprecedented funding shortfalls that will lead to reduced services, larger class sizes, more school closures, and a lack of support for children with special needs.

In difficult economic times like these, it is even more important to invest in public education and B.C.’s students.

Unfortunately, the provincial government continues to underfund B.C.’s school districts.

 Across B.C., 34 districts had their budgets frozen in 2009 even though fixed costs like negotiated contracts, transportation and utilities keep rising.

The result will be cuts to classrooms, fewer support staff for children with special needs, and new fees for the basics.

Some districts will begin charging already financially stretched families to send their children to school on the bus.

 The BC Teachers’ Federation, in consultation with our local associations, estimates more than 550 teaching positions will be lost over the summer. Such a significant reduction in teachers will mean larger class sizes and less support for individual students.

Last year, B.C. had more overcrowded classes than ever before and it is only going to get worse in 2009-10.

 This summer, please contact your newly elected MLA and the new minister of education, Margaret MacDiarmid, who are all getting ready for a new provincial budget on Sept. 1.

Tell them to put an end to the disruptive cutbacks and improve funding for public education.

Irene Lanzinger

President

B.C. Teachers’ Federation

Common sense prevails in trustee reinstatement

Re: Justice orders reinstatement of Victoria school trustee (News, June 24)

How comforting it is to know that justice and common sense have prevailed over political games by the “gang of five” trustees who rushed to try to dismiss Catherine Alpha from her position as school trustee over a simple error.  

Also, the purposeful “misspeaking” by Victoria school board chair Tom Ferris and the inaction of secretary-treasurer George Ambeault in not drawing Ms. Alpha’s attention to the mistake, drew specific censure from the judge.

 I hope these six individuals will offer to make good, out of their own pockets, the $40,000 already expended in starting up an unnecessary byelection that has now been cancelled.

This sum could have been better used in reducing the oversize classes that these trustees deemed acceptable for student learning last October.

May their names be remembered by the voting public during the next trustee elections.

Brad Myers

Saanich

•••

Many thanks to B.C. Supreme Court Justice Robert Metzger for his fair and just ruling in favour of school trustee Catherine Alpha.

I have watched with dismay the actions of the board majority (McEvoy, Pitre, Ferris, Holland and Leonard) toward trustee Alpha.

As a former trustee and board chair in the Greater Victoria school district, and as a taxpayer and elector in the district, I expect the board to compensate Catherine Alpha for her legal costs.

Moreover, I believe that the electorate and Catherine deserve an apology for the lack of fairness and competence in the handling of this matter.

Unnecessary expenditures on an unnecessary byelection in a time of school district deficits is an unacceptable waste of our education dollars.

Carol Pickup

Victoria

Secondary suites not the only problem

On the question of secondary suites allow me to put my two-bits in.

 My neighbour’s driveway has four cars and they park one on the street. The garage itself has no room for anything as mundane as a car. This is not a home with a secondary suite – this is a home with a father, mother and two young adults each with a car. The other car is one of the rotating stock of cars for sale.

 This family used to park anywhere they wanted but have succumbed to neighbourhood pressure to park as few cars on the street as possible allowing the rest of us to have visitors. It is a sign of the times that fewer and fewer people use their garages. 

The situation can only get worse with the suites. There are currently four “illegal” suites on my block of 25 houses and because it is a friendly neighbourhood the landlords keep a tight rein on their tenants – not everyone is so lucky. 

 I would like to know why the homeowner with a suite pays the same waste pickup fee as me yet they have double the permitted cans.

 As you can guess I am less than delighted with the prospect of dropping the restrictions as it is only a matter of time before they look at Saanich north of McKenzie.

Hugh Stevenson

Saanich

Voting system needs to be improved

The outcome of the recent referendum on electoral reform confirms my long-held belief that our current system of voting is badly flawed.

In every election we are continuously exhorted to “get out and vote” and that “every vote counts.”

But do they really count? We invested quite a lot of taxpayers money to develop the single transferable vote system, but it does not meet the challenge of every vote counts.

A much simpler, and less confusing system would be to have larger constituencies returning either two or three members.

This is my plea, the elected member would cast their vote in the House with the actual number of votes they received in the election.

Each member would be provided with two out-of-sight buttons under their desk, which would allow them to vote according to the their conscience, rather than to slavishly follow the dictates of the party whip. It would be a simple matter to tally the cumulative votes electronically.

Too logical or too radical a solution? It might possibly encourage people to get out and vote knowing that it would really count. No complicated single transferable vote.

David B. Buchanan

Victoria

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