Senior staff presented New Westminster trustees at Tuesday night's meeting with the results of a short consultation process asking elementary school parents, staff and students how they'd like to see the required additional minutes be added to the school day next year.
As The Record reported previously, trustees approved trustee MaryAnn Mortensen's motion calling for schools lengthen the school day by eight minutes in order to accommodate the new two-week spring break that students and staff will have next spring.
In response to this motion, staff developed a questionnaire sheet that was sent home with students attending New Westminster elementary schools. The questionnaire asked the respondents which option they preferred: add minutes to the start of the day, add minutes to the end of the day or add minutes to both the beginning and end of the day.
According to Superintendent John Woudzia, the majority of respondents were in agreement that the extra time be added to the end of the day.
"This preference was consistent for all schools involved in this process," he added in the report.
The calendar changes will take effect starting in September and all elementary schools were required to submit their final calendars for the 2013/14 school year by June 25.
Strategic plan consultations continue next fall
With the school budget officially approved by trustees, consultations for the district's strategic plan will be back on track starting this September, according to Superintendent John Woudzia.
Due to the time spent tweaking budget numbers and dealing with layoffs, consultations with the New Westminster School District's employee groups didn't happen, Wouldzia said.
Trustees at Tuesday night's meeting agreed the strategic plan needs to be a priority come the fall and should be before the board by December.
The strategic plan will include directives directly concerned with how the board makes decisions concerning things like the budget, so it's important it gets done as soon as possible, trustee MaryAnn Mortensen said during the meeting June 25.
Woudzia said he plans on meeting with all stakeholders, including the New Westminster Teachers' Union, CUPE 409 and the District Parent Advisory Council in September. He expects the strategic plan will be presented to the board sometime in October.
Trustee would like full air quality report from Metro Vancouver
Trustee MaryAnn Mortensen asked Superintendent John Woudzia if he could get a copy of Metro Vancouver's air quality report from the temporary monitoring station set up on Queensborough Middle School this past spring.
The board received for information a thank you letter from the regional authority for allowing them to use the middle school property, but Mortensen was curious to know if they'd be sharing their findings with the board.
According to trustee James Janzen, Metro Vancouver usually publishes the reports online but agreed it would be good to know exactly what they found.
Janzen said the letter, which stated "no exceedances of ambient air quality objectives were observed," was vague and further information should be provided.
To see up-to-date air quality ratings visit http://gis.metrovancouver.org/airmap.
