There’s a school board meeting tonight and here’s some of the highlights from the agenda:
Presentations
The New Westminster Secondary School’s music auxiliary will be there to urge trustees to support a number of recommendations they say will improve “the excellence, the accessibility, the equity and the sustainability of the music program” at the high school.
The parent-led group wants the board to reinstate all-year band at the middle schools; include music in the IB programming after Grade 10; increase funding to cover venue rentals, instrument repairs, supplies and bus trips; and work with venues and the city to bring down the cost of rentals for school groups.
Items needing final approval
There were several recommendations made earlier this month at the board committee meetings that trustees will be asked to vote on:
Child care
The district wants to create 136 new child-care spaces with funding from the provincial government.
The proposal is to have 37 spaces at the new Richard McBride Elementary school for infants and toddlers and kids aged three to five; 37 spaces for infants and toddlers and kids aged three to five at Queensborough Middle school; 25 spaces for kids aged three to five at Connaught Heights Elementary school; and another 37 spaces at F.W. Howay Elementary school for infants and toddlers and kids aged three to five.
These spaces would be created at no cost to the school district, and the recommendation also directs staff to develop a plan to expand before- and after-school care offerings within existing schools’ space.
Trustee remuneration
At the Feb. 12 operations policy and planning committee meeting, trustees voted in favour of recommending the school board approve a one-time, 11 per cent increase to their remuneration. This increase is meant to offset tax changes that came into effect on Jan. 1, 2019.
Before this year, only 67 per cent of an elected official’s remuneration, also called a stipend, was taxed, while the remainder was paid tax-free to recognize possible personal expenses. Now the government is taxing the entire stipend and allowing some expenses to be claimed when filing taxes.
The increase would cost the district $17,699. Trustees’ pay will rise from $22,320 to $24,775 per year, while the vice-chair’s pay would rise from $23,876 to $26,502 and the chair’s pay would rise from $25,432 to $28,230.
Pad and tampon dispensers
This could be a historic vote.
Trustees will give final approval to a recommendation to install coin-free dispensers for menstrual products in all its schools by September 2019.
Staff estimate it’ll cost about $9,784 to set up, which includes the cost of purchasing 30 coin-free dispensers and enough pads and tampons to stock them, and about $7,000 annually to keep them stocked.
Trustees have also been asked to approve a recommendation to submit a motion to the 2019 BCSTA annual general meeting asking the association to request the ministries of education and finance provide funding to all school districts in B.C. to purchase, install and supply free pad and tampon dispensers.
What’s the difference between a board committee meeting and a school board meeting?
Seems like there’s some confusion about the difference between the school board meetings and committee meetings that trustees attend each month; here’s the cliff notes:
The New Westminster board of education holds one school board meeting every month, typically on the last Tuesday of the month. (The only exceptions are December and March, when the meetings are held mid-month because of winter and spring break.)
This monthly meeting is led by the school board chair; right now that is Mark Gifford. Anita Ansari is serving as vice-chair.
Every board meeting includes a few staple items, including: correspondence, board committee reports, reports from senior management, trustee reports and a 15-minute question period when the public can ask questions about issues that were brought up during the meeting.
The board meetings also include recommendations forwarded from the education policy and planning committee, which meets the first Tuesday of the month and is chaired by trustee Gurveen Dhaliwal, and the operations policy and planning committee, which meets the second Tuesday of every month and is chaired by trustee Danielle Connelly.
The entire board of education sits on both committees.
The committee meetings are less formal than the school board meetings. Staff present reports and may or may not include recommendations for the board to vote on. If there is a recommendation and it is supported by a majority of the trustees at the committee meeting, it’s forwarded to the monthly school board meeting for final approval.
When committee recommendations are presented at the monthly board meeting, trustees can make amendments or send them back to staff for further information. Trustees can even vote down a recommendation they approved at the committee meeting earlier in the month.
Agendas and minutes for all committee and school board meetings can be found online at tinyurl.com/sd40meetings.
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The school board meeting is tonight, Tuesday, Feb. 26, at 7:30 p.m.at the school board office, 811 Ontario St. Follow me (Cayley) Twitter for live updates from the meeting.
