April 30, 2021

Education Week and the importance of local decision-making

Education Week 2021 in Alberta is from May 3 to May 7.

This is a great time to highlight the importance of public education and the equally important role of public schools – and public school board trustees – in their local communities.

But our public schools do not exist singularly or in a vacuum. Each public school is part of a public school jurisdiction that is governed by a group of locally-elected school board trustees.

Each year, the Alberta government allocates more than $8.2 billion for K-12 education, and it is distributed on a per-student basis. Much of this funding goes to local area school boards around the province. Each school board has schools, teachers and administrative staff responsible for operating all of the schools in its jurisdiction and for meeting the educational needs of the students in their schools.

Every four years, the voters of these communities elect school board trustees to represent them and make decisions on their behalf. The trustees of each jurisdiction form an oversight board, and they are responsible and accountable for ensuring their jurisdiction’s share of provincial funding for K-12 education is appropriately and efficiently spent, to best meet the local needs of the community.

This fundamental role is at the heart of the Public School Board’s Association of Alberta’s fourth belief statement: “Public schools are governed by democratically-elected trustees, accountable to communities and the province.”

Educational needs can vary greatly from community to community. The needs of smaller communities in rural southeast Alberta, where I live, are very different from the needs of a large, urban city like Calgary or Edmonton. A one-size-fits-all approach to education funding does not work everywhere in the province. This is the value of the local school board trustee: local decision-making that specifically benefits the local community.

Every trustee, regardless of where in Alberta they live, shares the same goal: to offer a world-class education to every K-12 student, through innovation, diversity, and equitable learning experiences. Trustees are passionately committed to providing exceptional learning opportunities for every student – regardless of geographic location, background, or ability.

We do this work because we love public school education, we love our communities and we want to see the very best possible outcomes for the next generation of young people who will one day take the torch that we pass to them.

Every four years, members of communities across Alberta elect the public school board trustee who will best represent them. This is an election year, and school board trustee elections will be held on Monday, October 18, 2021, along with municipal elections.

It may surprise you to know that Alberta is only one of a handful of provinces left with local school board trustees, along with BC, Saskatchewan and Ontario. You may feel that because you don’t have any school-age children in your family that there is no need to vote for a local school board trustee. May I suggest that your vote is even more important this year than ever before. Your local public schools are teaching tomorrow’s leaders of our communities, health care professionals, financial professionals, tradespeople and yes, teachers.

I hope you will take the time to research which candidate will best represent you, your values and your concerns, and then get out and vote on October 18. Your community and the leaders of tomorrow are counting on you.

Cathy Hogg,
President