BARRHEAD/WESTLOCK – Last year was another challenging year for Pembina Hills School Division (PHSD) students, staff and trustees, says board chair Judy Lefebvre.
Lefebvre reflected on some of those challenges, and the ones they face going into 2023, in a year-end interview.
As expected, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic manifested well into 2022, she said, noting absenteeism reached a high of 210 students on Feb. 1, compared to just 15 on April 12. At the same time, staff absences reached a high of 26 on Feb. 1, to only six on April 12.
Throughout this period, Lefebvre said the school division was abiding by the health restrictions imposed by Alberta Health Service (AHS), such as mandatory masking regulations and limits on gathering sizes. PHSD also instituted a mandatory vaccination requirement that required staff and volunteers entering PHSD property to be vaccinated or to present a negative result from a rapid test. The board enacted the policy in the fall of 2021 following a recommendation from the province that suggested school boards create policies to enforce mandatory proof of vaccination or a negative result from a screening test for all employees, volunteers and contractors in our schools. PHSD rescinded the policy in June 2022. In mid-February, the province also dropped the mandatory masking requirement.
Although COVID presented challenges to schools to continue to provide student learning opportunities, Lefebvre noted that while, at times, learning temporarily moved online, no schools were closed during this time.
"COVID also created an unprecedented situation in student learning loss," she said. "Government grants were made available to Pembina Hills to address significant gaps in student learning because of the pandemic," she said.
Lefebvre added mental health issues also surfaced as "an area of grave concern" and that the board transferred funds from its operating reserves, which allowed PHSD to hire additional staff to help students with any mental health issues, as well as learning loss.
She pointed to the division's program of placing lead teachers in place for literacy and numeracy to provide additional support for students.
In addition, Lefebvre said the division successfully applied to Alberta Education to be included in the Mental Health in Schools pilot program that gave PHSD $542,000 designated as support for social workers in schools until June 2024.
However, Lefebvre said trustees were excited that students returned to a sense of normalcy at the end of the 2021-22 school year, as witnessed by a restriction-free graduation.
"(In August) the board hosted a welcome back breakfast for over 600 Pembina Hills employees in Westlock," she said. "This was momentous as COVID had made large gatherings impossible for two years."
Transportation challenges
Lefebvre also noted transportation issues continued to plague Pembina Hills in 2022.
"Driver shortages accounted for most of the challenges, and while Pembina Hills tried to ensure that students were safely transported to and from school, that did not always happen," she said.
To help cut into the shortage, Lefebvre said PHSD offered the necessary school bus driver training and that by the end of the year, they added 12 casual drivers.
The other transportation issue facing the school division in 2022 and continues into 2023 is the high price of diesel, but Lefebvre said school divisions received some welcomed news when the province reinstated the Fuel Price Contingency Program.
The Progressive Conservative government eliminated the program, whose purpose was to protect school divisions from the fluctuating price of fuel in 2013.
"This unexpected funding was welcome news and provided some relief to an expected deficit in the budget," she said.
New Curriculum
The rollout for the K-Grade 3, English and language arts and literature, as well as the K-6 physical education and wellness, started at the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year.
Lefebvre noted the school division has been preparing for the curriculum since the spring, offering teachers professional learning opportunities.
She added that when the province released the curriculum, PHSD's education services gathered teachers so they could provide feedback through readiness surveys.
And in June, Lefebvre said, one teacher in each of the schools of the impacted grade levels spent a day "unpacking the architecture of the new curriculum".
She also noted that PHSD set aside four professional development (PD) days for teachers to meet in grade groups to establish lesson plans and writing exemplars.
Lefebvre said the most significant change in the curriculum was that the stated learning outcomes changed dramatically, and teachers, during PD days and other sessions to "build a continuum of learning to help bridge the gaps."
She added that further challenges are expected when the province rollouts the changes to the new Grade 4-6 math curriculum for the 2023-2024 school year.
Infrastructure improvements
Topping the list of PHSD's three-year capital plan is a full modernization of Barrhead Composite High School (BCHS), followed by Westlock and Barrhead elementary schools.
Lefebvre explained that infrastructure projects, such as school replacements or modernizations, fall in the same line as hospitals, highways and parks, so there is a lot of competition for available funds.
And although so far PHSD has not been fortunate enough to have any of their capital projects approved, they have received Infrastructure Maintenance Renewal grant funding which allowed the division to update several updates at BCHS, Barrhead Elementary, Neerlandia Public Christian School, Pembina North Community School, Busby School and R.F. Staples.
Looking into the future
Lefebvre also talked about the board's effort to collaborate with their municipal partners, MLAs, and with other school divisions through PHSD's memberships in the Alberta School Boards Association (ASBA) and the Public School Boards Association of Alberta (PSBAA) along with the connections the division made by attending the Alberta Rural Education Symposium.
"As Pembina Hills advances through the coming year, we are confident that the school division's priorities of student-staff relationships, a focus on literacy and numeracy and support for staff will again be driving factors in ensuring that the learning needs of students and staff will continue to meet anticipated outcomes," she said. "While the pandemic created all kinds of adversity and challenges for everyone, our focus is moving forward and enhancing the wellbeing and learning of staff and students."
