In Alberta, voters are expected to declare themselves as supporters of either the Catholic Separate School Board or the Public Board, and vote accordingly.  Everyone is eventually affected by what happens in schools, and so everyone who is ientitled to vote has the right to vote in a school board election.  I hope to help with the campaign of a candidate in this year's election, whoever is running against the incumbent trustee for my ward.

I agree with that, so why can't I vote in both?  There are also parents who have students in multiple school boards.

Ontario is much the same. Your tax assessment determines where your education tax goes and that, in turn, determines which board you vote for. I'm a public school taxpayer so I'm a public school elector. I practice, the education money is now pooled and paid out based on a per capita formula so the relevance of your tax status to your voting status is a little muddy now.

 

The other reality is that school boards are becoming less and less relevant here. Curriculum is largely controlled by the Ministry of Education now and, since last year's labour dust-up with the teacher, the province is pretty much in control of the teachers' contracts. The law officially says that it the boards that negotiate the deals but last year the province pretty much said "here is what you can accept" and if they are dictating the terms to the boards, then it may as well be them rather than the boards doing the negotiating.

 

Certainly, there are areas where boards can still act individually (e.g. special ed and gifted ed; transportation contracts for school buses; support services like custodial) but as the province centralizes more and more it's getting harder to see the real relevance of elected local boards. Local administrations to manage local schools and activities, sure, but an elected board seems kind of hard to justify when they are mostly just implementing programs and policies handed down from the province.

 

Mendalla

 

I think in Saskatchewan you can split taxes to both School Boards - Public and separate if you have kids attending both.

How do you vote there CH?

Here we only have public . . . and everyone on the voter's list (municipal) votes. 

 

The school board is elected along with the municipal elections (mayor/councillors).

 

 

It's pretty much the same here Beloved.  There's no actual voter's list though, AFAIK.

Actually Alberta is a bit more complicated folks-you declare Catholic or Non-Catholic. Only because in St. Albert the Public school is Catholic and the SeparateSchool is Non-Catholic.

Sometimes there are 4 school boards Francophone non-catholic and franco phone catholic.

But taxes are now split per capita-and school board levies (taxes) are now set by province.

I have a friend In Edmonton running. Heather MacKenzie-has been on school board is now running for city council.

Active in the United Church.

I'd vote for her if I was in Edmonton.

 

The St. Albert situation is now chagned (and they/we [I grew up there] were not the only example in the province back when I was in discussions about it).  The former PSSD is now the Public board--which they were functioning as for decades in practical terms.  There were discussions about changing hte designation 30 years ago--before the Catholic board was made a more regioinal board--but it was kept for historical reasons.

I

 I thought that changed?  I never understood it when I actually lived there though.

 

How do you declare yourself Catholic or Non-Catholic?  Is it just dependent on which category you decide to vote for, or is their something else I need to do?

You declare which division --Public or Separate-- you want your taxes to go toward.  Originally (and I guess still is) the default was that you were assigned to the Public System unless you specified otherwise.  But now that the province has changed teh education tax system (and somewhat handcuffed local school boards in doing so)it is not as big a diffference afaik. 

As an outsider, this whole idea of having a Catholic public school system is ridiculous! If you have a Catholic public school system, then you should also have a United Church one, a Jewish one, a Muslim one, etc.

 

Back to the subject of the opening post, as someone who is not a parent and does not work within the school system, I choose not to vote for school boards as I feel that decision should be made by the people whom it is going to directly affect.

Somegal, I agree about the Catholic system is ridiculous.  If I had the chance to vote in favour or getting rid of it, I would.

 

I find it interesting that you don't vote for the school boards considering your job.

I just haven't come across that yet.  Will I be able to when I get my property tax assessment?  Not that it really matters, but I'm just clueless about it.

We got a form when we first bought the house, I can't remember if it was with the assessment or separately.

The Separate Schoool System is a holdover from history.  Originally it was to protect minority rights, to keep the Catholic minority outside Quebec from beign overwhelmed from the Protestant majority (because the assumption was that ALL schools had a faith contingent--not surprising since it was church folk who pushed for publicly funded education--and Publuic Schools in most areas were Protestant).

 

In ST. Albert, until recently, the Public District was Catholic because when it was formed St. Albert was overwhelmingly an RC community.  Then in the 18950's a Protestant Separate District was formed which by the 1970's was operating as the de facto public system in that it covered everyone except the RC (or those who chose RC schooling).

 

And in some places (such as NFLD) there were a variety of faith-based schools until they made constitutional changes a number of years back.

 

I would (and have) argued that the minority rights argument is not as valid anymore.  But I also think there is some value in famileis having more than one Schoool District to choose from.

I don't recall having the opportunity to choose.  I moved to AB seven years ago and have voted in every municipal election since (though not for School Board Trustee since I never see them at any of the candidates' events).  It is strange though that as a renter I have not had the option to 'declare' which division.  Maybe that would work if there was a voters list, but there isn't in Lethbridge so I'm not sure how they would know anyway.

Hilary, you wouldn't have paid property taxes though (at least not directly).

I've paid for about 1/2 a year's worth and wasn't given the option.

Gord, I agree that choice is nice.  How many families actually get the choice though?T

There are times the board accepts students of other faiths, and there are times when they request to see a baptism certificate.  If a student is expelled from a Catholic school, another Catholic school doesn't have to take them.  A Public school must accept them.  The reverse isn't true.

 

I would argue that choice is the school is more important than the board.  I would be ok with 2 public boards, but I don't know what that would actually accomplish.

Ontario's Separate (Catholic) school system is constitutionally protected up to, IIRC, grade 8. Catholic high schools used to be effectively private but just before he retired, Premier Bill Davis' last government extended funding to grade 13 (later grade 12 when Ontario ditched 13).

 

Personally, I would rather have one,well-run, properly funded, secular public school system and then allow anyone who wants their religion taught to go to private schools or use home schooling. However, I also know that changing the constitutional guarantees around the separate schools won't be easy.

 

In Ontario, non-Catholics can go to Separate schools if the school has space (i.e. has accomodated all the Catholics in its catchment area). You are still required to go to religion class even if you aren't RC. My son's friend is doing this because the public high school where he lives is apparently not a great place (it's a small city where each board only has one high school).

 

Mendalla

 

Or at least that's how it was when I was in school.   I just remembered this:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/catholic-students-find-way-to-sta...

So overcrowded public schools are looking at ways to get some kids switched to the Catholic board.

New Brunswick votes for school trustees. But few vote. almost none have any idea who their trustees are. Most ot the trustees are planted in position to be agents of the province's leading businessmen - who see possibilities of making money out of the schools..

Few have the foggiest idea of what schools are about.

The Parents' Association and Home and School are equally useless.

I found the same situation prevailed in my six years of teaching in public schools in Montreal.

 

I think that's generically true. Certainly, it's been the case everywhere that I've lived in Ontario. The problem is twofold. School board elections are hitched to municipal elections and most people who care at all (and given the poor turnouts for municipal votes, that doesn't seem to be very many) focus on the councillors and mayors, perceiving those to be more significant positions. The other is that some (perhaps many) trustees are using the position as a political springboard and have their eyes on council or even provincial seats in the long haul. IOW, even they don't necessarily have a longterm interest in the position (though some do and I've seen some stick around on the board for years).

 

Mendalla

 

It doesn't help that the wards are different for each board.  Councillor is one ward, catholic board is another, public/non-catholic is a 3rd.

THis blogpost seems appropriate to this thread:
http://davidbiltek.wordpress.com/2013/09/03/school-boards-why/

 

We just got the school declaration in the mail today.

I am very happy that Sheila Taylor is the new chair of the Calgary Board of Education.  She had the courage to persist in asking the administration the kinds of questions that trustees are supposed to act.  Joy, who was elected at the same time and usually supported Sheila is now the deputy chair -- justice served.  I am hopeful that the administration understands the situation now and will either change their behaviour or choose to retire or leave.  The Director must have seen the writing on the wall because she offered her early resignation weeks before the election.