Living Sky facing lessened provincial funding due to lower enrolment

Apr 12, 2018 | 1:00 PM

Living Sky School Division will see a decline in funding from the province for the 2018-19 school year, largely due to a decline in enrolment.

Board Chair Ronna Pethick said education funding increased in the province overall in the recent budget, but the Battlefords-area division will receive less money because of the decline in student numbers. The division will receive about $653,000 less funding for the next school year. As a result, the total funding it will receive from the province for the 2018-19 school year is $59,700,516.

“A good portion of that is due mainly to a decrease in enrolment of students, so that impacts us greatly,” Pethick said.

She said the division is projecting enrolment will decrease by about 100 students next year.

The division had 5,576 enrolled on September 30, 2017, for the current school year, compared to 5,453 projected for September 30, 2018.

Pethick said the division projected there would be a decline in enrolment, so it was not a surprise. She said some families likely had to move out of the area to seek employment elsewhere because of challenges in the oil and gas sectors that have affected many in local area communities.

“We’re still analyzing our data, and we’re still analyzing why we’ve had such a reduction,” Pethick added.

She said the division is graduating large Grade 12 classes, but seeing smaller kindergarten classes coming into the system.

“I think that’s a reality everywhere in rural Saskatchewan,” she said. “We’ve had to make some very difficult decisions over the last few years because of budget cuts … We’ll be working through the funding allocation again this year to determine what it means for next year.”

She said senior administration and the board will be going through the division’s budget over the weeks to come, “trying to find ways to realize and make up for that $653,000 deficit.”

Pethick said if the division wasn’t dealing with a decrease in students, the budget would have been status-quo compared to last year. At this point, Pethick said she doesn’t know what cuts the division will need to make as a result of the funding loss, but the division will have to comb through its budget to find ways to make up for the shortfall.

“Whenever you have a decrease in the budget or not, anytime you have a decrease in students you always look at the pupil-teacher ratio. So you are always looking at staff numbers,” she said. “This year would be no different.”

Pethick noted the board won’t be using the division’s reserves to make up for the loss in funding, and noted the division has a strategic plan it is following that is “key to our budget,” as far as future decision-making goes.

“It all comes down to our students and our strategic plan,” she said. “We will find ways in order to support our plan and support our students. We need them to succeed and be successful. It’s the most important thing we do.”

The division has been looking at the possibility of consolidating its Cut Knife high school and elementary school into one due to declining enrolment. However, the school community councils are still in the process of discussing this proposal with a facilitator and haven’t made any decisions yet. The school community councils would need to make a recommendation on consolidation before it would be considered by the school division board.

Overall, Pethick said the school division appreciates Premier Scott Moe’s efforts in supporting education in Saskatchewan reflected in the budget.   

“Living Sky School Division is really pleased that Premier Scott Moe is committed to keeping his promise in his leadership campaign, with the government restoring some funding back into education in our province,” she said.

Pethick said the division thanks Moe for making education “a top priority” as well as Education Minister Gord Wyant for “re-prioritizing support for our province’s students.”

 

angela.brown@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @battlefordsnow