ATHABASCA – Representatives from Aspen View Public Schools (AVPS) came prepared to the Nov. 14 Athabasca County council meeting, with numbers showing the school division's enrolment rebound from the COVID-19 years, as well as possible places the two institutions can work together on advocacy.
Councillors passed a motion 8-1 to direct city staff to explore increased funding through Family and Community Support Services (FCSS) for the mentorship program.
AVPS superintendent and CEO of schools Constantine Kastrinos was joined by board chair Candy Nikipelo, vice chair Anne Karczmarczyk, and trustee Dennis MacNeil for the presentation, where he shared some of the successes, and touched on places AVPS was looking to collaborate with the county.
“I’m new to the community, and one of the biggest challenges I found was finding a place to rent, and then comparatively, retaining and attracting staff is another major challenge for us,” said Kastrinos. “It’s hard to attract teachers, and one of the big issues is affordable and viable housing. I think together, we could have conversations about this and about how we can support each other around this.”
Nikipelo spoke to the challenges AVPS has had attracting teachers, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic. While AVPS has a good teacher-to-student ratio — reeve Brian Hall called it, “the envy of every other school division,” — recruitment is a consistent struggle for the organization.
“Even in Athabasca, we have some unfilled teacher positions, which is becoming a challenge in our schools; we have teachers filling multiple holes and wearing multiple hats,” said Nikipelo.
“We’re incentivizing some of these job opportunities outside of the collective agreement contracts — things like a moving allowance, or a small signing bonus. There’s so much competition for work right now,” added Kastrinos. “Over the last few years, it’s no secret that we’ve seen a decline in the profession.”
Apprenticeship opportunities
Another topic of discussion was the resurgence of the Registered Apprenticeship Program (RAP), which pairs high school students with local businesses. Kastrinos said 256 credits, which correlates to roughly 60 students, were completed in the previous year.
“It’s something that we want to redouble our efforts into, it’s not something where we’re saying, ‘Well that’s enough,’” said Kastrinos. “We’re seeing students getting re-engaged with the program, it’s almost like someone turned a tap off during COVID, and now students, families, and communities are saying that they want to return to it.”
Coun. Rob Minns spoke highly of RAP, and said he had worked with a variety of student apprentices during his time at the Athabasca County public works department.
“I have two kids that went through the program, and I don’t think there’s a program out there that is that huge impact-wise,” said Minns. “When they go to their apprenticeship, they have 1,500 to 2,000 hours already under their belt. That’s such a huge entry into adulthood, that you aren’t wasting your time going to an apprenticeship that you don’t like.”
Technology usage
AVPS’s technology policies were also discussed, with Hall asking about screen time usage in schools — the reeve cited a recent report that said Canadian teens are spending eight to nine hours a day in front of screens, and he wanted to know what role AVPS played in protecting children from that potential harm.
“We talked with kids last year through student voice, and we asked them about their thoughts on social media and screen time,” said Karczmarczyk. “We also have a session upcoming for parents to attend on social media and the effects of it.”
While cellphones are covered by the division's technology policy, Aspen View tries to leave it up to the principals and Nikipelo said the lack of an overarching policy on cellphones was intentional.
“Our schools are so unique and individual that (an overarching policy) would be a disservice to our schools. We let principals specifically develop their own procedures on cellphones, and that can vary class to class,” said Nikipelo. “Especially in the older grades, teachers know that students all have cellphones, and some will let the students use them to access information, and we have some that don’t like that. We’re pretty confident that our principals understand the norm for their schools. They know their students and the student body best.”
