The Editor:
It’s the start of a new school year and it looks like, once again, pre-K learners are going to be left behind.
There was the hugely controversial move to remove our Neighbourhood Learning Centre space and 72 daycare spaces from Qayqayt Elementary and Fraser River Middle School without consultation (after Community First incumbents, days before an election, promised to the contrary), and it looks like the board has more plans for this year and is indicating stronger than ever that pre-K learners do not matter.
First, there was the discussion at the first city council meeting after the summer break, where we found out the board wanted to work on “guiding principles” for child care rather than a protocol, and to shunt all the responsibility for daycare to the city.
Then there is the Long Range Facilities Plan, which seeks to exclude non-school-age children from board property and to prioritize K-12 at their expense.
That same facilities plan suggests that the child-care spaces the board gained were “reclaimed.” This is an extremely dishonest framing because the spaces in Qayqayt and Fraser River Middle School were never designated for K-12 learners. The daycares in those two schools were always daycares, and those spaces wouldn’t exist in schools today had they not been built for the daycares.
And finally, again in the Long Range Facilities Plan, a nod to a previously ignored board policy that requires the board to consult with stakeholders before making changes to daycare spaces. Given their cavalier attitude to following policy — including this very specific policy — I don’t think anyone in the city should believe they’d actually adhere to this policy in the future.
All of this shows a board that does not believe in child care.
Education doesn’t begin in kindergarten. The mandate letter to the Minister of Education and Childcare makes it clear that pre-K students should be a priority. This board has a job to do, and it needs to stop passing the buck and giving excuses and start actually fulfilling their election promise to increase daycare spaces in our schools.
James Plett
