Community Alliance For Public Education

Our Trustee Eden

       Principiis Obsta…Finem Respice 

       Resist the Beginning…Consider the End

“Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.”  – Romans 13

 As it has often been lately, the gallery this evening was packed – employees and parents all listening for the sound of the uprising we need to brush away the intentions of this government once and for all. Budget time is here and 9 trustees could change this part of our world forever with the lifting of a hand at the right moment.

It hasn’t happened of course but there is a different climate these days and you never know when a great leap forward will materialise. And sometimes when I need it most, a lilting moment of pure light infuses the board room and brings me strength. That is how I felt and I am very serious about this – when a large contingent of our maintenance workers trooped into the boardroom this evening to take in the sights and sounds of a real live meeting of the trustees. When the smoke clears the most important result of all our work is a budget which meets every criterion of excellence for our kids as well as justice and democracy for our employees. The presence of our dedicated employees fortified my conviction I would far rather be fired bringing in a budget which will proudly uphold those goals than cling pathetically to the petty authority we have to impose savage cuts and layoffs.

As long as I have been a trustee- not that long but it seems like an eternity – I have been told quite sternly all recommendations made at district committee tables must be confirmed by the board before they have any viability at all. I have never heard anyone from among our partners who sit on these committees no matter how dismayed they may often be by the tendencies of the trustees, contradict this standing canon. So when the District Finance Committee passed the following recommendation at the January 13^th 2010 meeting as follows: “That this Committee requests the Secretary Treasurer to prepare the 2010/2011 budget using the bare bones budget model as presented” – I certainly saw the matter coming to the board for endorsement.

  I am not so befuddled I envisioned a supreme moment of rebellion overturning this,  you understand but I did hope we might discuss the wisdom of this so called ‘bare bones’ budget model and the need to provide direction to senior staff which was based on more than a bit of accounting flotsam and flannel. But – I am disappointed to report the board has been persuaded no such discussion is necessary and for the first time in living memory a recommendation from a committee has simply been endowed with the weight of a board endorsement without benefit of visiting our table.

Here is where it falls down – this vote at Finance was terribly close – 8 in favour with 7 against. Every voting member of our employee groups as well as the Hwulmuhw representatives voted against this ‘bare bones’ budget model. Had things gone just a tad differently and we had failed the motion and brought -as we intended- a follow-up motion “to instruct  the Secretary Treasurer to prepare the 2010/2011 budget in accordance with a model which fully supports quality public educational programs and services in Cowichan based on the requirements identified by our families, employee groups, Hwulmuhw representatives and senior staff”- I would imagine this recommendation would have been back at the board table for a good smack before you could say governance irregularity.

What this means is our community will not see its influence play any role in the building of the budget which will determine how our schools are funded. The unelected local ministry cadre will have a limitless line of offense without even a whisper of dissent. Or will they?

All in all it has been a pretty disappointing process so afar. We have been wrangling over how we should conduct our review of the school calendar should we wish to offset costs again by cutting out instructional time – seems the Bylaw which governs any proposed changes to the school calendar is inconvenient and unclear – have a look and see what you think.  http://www.sd79.bc.ca/Policy%20doc./pdf/Bylaw%20No%204.pdf

As you will see, we did not live up to its rigours in the last process by which we revised the calendar. This district slipped out a week of instruction for our kids and a week’s income for some of our hardest working yet lowest paid employees without following the approval process laid out in the bylaw – opting instead for a slight email survey which failed to reach everyone and did not provide any details about the real life consequences of this proposal. The district has been trying to upend the bylaw by simply maintaining it is an outdated bit of old doggerel we can safely skirt in exchange for something more streamlined toward the task of shaping teaching time to imposed budget limitations. Tonight we did for now confirm we would stay with the bylaw rather than downgrade the process to a board policy – let’s hope this year we exercise its protocols.

Late last year the District Funding Subcommittee -charged with ‘developing strategies to increase the level of public funding for our schools’ -came to the board with the simple idea of holding a community forum to outline the budget challenges the ministry is attempting to enforce and mobilise our community to influence the government regarding public school funding. In principle the meeting idea sailed on – later we returned with a more detailed concept which again was confirmed by the board.

So on Tuesday March 30th 7 pm we are to hold an open forum at the Koksilah School Gym entitled:

“THE QUALITY PUBLIC EDUCATION OUR CHILDREN DESERVE”

I can’t put my finger on it but I get the unpleasant feeling some members of the board are suffering from a bit of regret and really have no wish to proceed with the meeting. The level of suspicion and fear engendered by a rather benign program which includes the President of the Charter for Public Education Network as our guest speaker is remarkable. The meeting agenda is being viewed like a full scale design for a missile launch from North Korea (in code you understand).It all seems a bit over the top for such an exercise but should we actually manage to navigate through the homeland security protocols and make it out the other side without having to provide a urine sample I will let you know. Come to think of it – the urine sample should not be a problem as I have an inexhaustible supply.

In closing I draw your attention to the quote at the beginning of the report – nothing like the Bible to supply a sobering reminder our associations are still defined by arbitrary power. In short – the guys in charge always write the rules to suit themselves and manage to make it all sound as if they have a direct line to some Supreme Being who works exclusively for them. Very little has changed since the authors of the Book of Romans offered us their opinion –they must have really thought the toiling goofballs they were addressing were profoundly dopey. It is depressingly familiar.

Sounds a bit like the School Act which reminds us we can only fund our schools according to the revenue we are allotted by a government which evidently doesn’t give a rat’s ass about public services anyway – our needs and priorities are of no interest to the Ministry – but unlike the authorities in the New Testament it may be time to remind our government they are not appointed by God but elected by us.

Amen…

Your Trustee Pal

Eden