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Everything is up for discussion

Pembina Hills Public Schools (PHPS) trustees and school administrators are going to have to make some tough choices in the coming months and years. In late May trustees approved a budget that will see them going into the hole.

Pembina Hills Public Schools (PHPS) trustees and school administrators are going to have to make some tough choices in the coming months and years.
In late May trustees approved a budget that will see them going into the hole.
Well, that isn’t entirely true.
In Alberta, school divisions are not allowed to have deficit budgets, unless they have sufficient funds stowed away to cover the shortfall. So in reality, while trustees approved an expected $1.042 million operating budget deficit, PHPS’ budget is balanced. They just had to dip into their reserves to do it.
The question is just how much longer can they do it before it impacts how the division operates and even more importantly, the quality of education students receive.
Some may say it already has. Depending on what PHPS school a child attends, in September, parents might notice programming that was offered this year is not available and there is less staff.
And in all likelihood, it is going to get worse before it gets better.
Like it or not a large portion of a school or school division’s revenue is linked to student enrolment.
For a number of years PHPS, like the majority of rural school divisions, are seeing their enrolment numbers shrink. Although we applaud the school division’s effort to strengthen the communities and bolster school enrolment numbers by offering a financial incentive to live within its borders the truth, we believe it will make very little difference in school attendance.
Unless a new major employer comes, that brings with it a large influx of young families the number of students going to PHPS schools will continue to decrease. Especially when you consider the trend of couples deciding to have smaller families.
This means PHPS will have to continue to deplete its reserves, find other revenue streams, which is difficult now that the school divisions can no longer charge instructional fees. Mind you in the loss of this revenue was offset by grants, but if school divisions will continue to get this grant in future years is anyone’s guess.
Then there is the cutback route. And even here, options are limited. Education is a people business with the majority of the expense being people — teachers, program assistants, and other various professionals. To deliver the curriculum you need a certain number of people. You can only cram so many students into a classroom and still expect them to be able to learn.
However, one thing that might be up for discussion in the future is providing free busing to parents if they want to enroll their children in alternative programming that isn’t available at their designated school, i.e. Christian education at Neerlandia Public Christian School (NPCS) or the French immersion program at Barrhead Elementary School (BES). Not that we are advocating this, but when a school board has posted a deficit for five consecutive years everything is up for discussion.


Barry Kerton

About the Author: Barry Kerton

Barry Kerton is the managing editor of the Barrhead Leader, joining the paper in 2014. He covers news, municipal politics and sports.
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