BARRHEAD - The Alberta Distance Learning Centre (ADLC) is not simply a distance education school, but rather a provincial service that levels the playing field for access to distance education across Alberta.
That was one of the messages delivered to Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock MLA Glenn van Dijken during a March 13 visit to the ADLC.
And that presentation — minus a few personal demonstrations by ADLC staff — was delivered once again to the Pembina Hills School Division trustees at their March 18 meeting, so that they could hear what information was presented to the MLA and what will be shared with other representatives of Alberta Education in the coming weeks.
Since 1997, Pembina Hills has had a service agreement with Alberta Education to operate the ADLC.
“No other school divisions are working from that type of a framework,” board chair Jennifer Tuininga noted.
Previously, the ADLC had campuses in Lethbridge, Calgary and Edmonton, but at the request of the provincial government, operations were centralized in Barrhead over the past year and those campuses were closed.
“That was to reduce expenses, to better co-ordinate our services and also just to support the local community,” said Tuininga.
The ADLC also began to focus more on student instruction and providing services to teachers. Notably, the centre no longer serves adult students, only focusing on children who are still in school.
Tuininga said they also changed from a year-round service to become more closely aligned to the school year, meaning that a student can no longer enroll in a course with just a couple weeks or months remaining before the end of the year.
She stressed the point that students cannot enroll directly at ADLC; they have to go through their designated school in order to register.
“The school authority remains responsible for the student’s needs and support,” said Tuininga. “Nobody graduates from ADLC. You graduate from your community school.”
The ADLC provides service to 142 school authorities and approximately 911 schools across the province, which adds up to nearly 35,000 course registrations.
This includes 100 per cent of public and separate school authorities in Alberta, 100 per cent of Francophone schools, 62 per cent of charter schools and 39 per cent of all federal First Nations and private schools.
A necessary service
A day after the release of the provincial budget on Feb. 28, Pembina Hills Supt. David Garbutt posted an update to the ADLC’s website stating they had received notice from deputy education minister Andre Corbould that the service agreement between the school division and the province to operate the ADLC would be concluded in two years.
Furthermore, Garbutt said they would receive $14 million in funding from the province 2020-2021 and $7 million in 2021-2022.
For reference, the 2019-2020 budget of the ADLC, which trustees passed back in June, totals $18.535 million in revenue and expenses. Approximately $17.015 million was budgeted to come directly from Alberta Education to operate the ADLC.
On March 4, Pembina Hills representatives consulted with Alberta Education and confirmed that the province intended to conclude the service agreement in two years.
Tuininga said that when they learned the minister of education had received some feedback suggesting that the ADLC was “unnecessary,” they reached out to distance education facilitators at all 911 schools.
“They are the ones with the boots on the ground. They are the ones who understand how ADLC works and how it’s supporting their schools and their students,” she said.
“Within one week, we put out a survey to those folks, and we received over 700 responses, which is just an amazing response … The comments were fantastic. I think people felt it was a way to communicate why they needed the service for their local schools.”
A full 46 per cent of respondents said the ADLC’s services were critical to their school’s programming, while 32 per cent said it complements or completes their school’s programming.
Eighteen per cent indicated the ADLC merely supplements their programming, while one per cent of respondents indicated it had no effect. The remaining three per cent gave no definitive answer.
Tuininga then moved on to a slide summarizing all the reasons that teachers utilize ADLC resources, based on more than 700 responses.
A total of 493 teachers indicated “Students needing support while away from school for medical and other personal circumstances.” Another 391 said they used ADLC resources to support teacher lesson planning, while 380 said it was because they were teaching multi-graded classrooms.
A total of 348 respondents indicated they had a complex teaching assignment with high number of classes to prepare, while 315 teachers said they were dealing with mid-term or mid-semester changes in student programming.
Finally, 310 respondents indicated they relied on the ADLC because they had recently taken on a new teaching assignment and 265 needed the resources to support teacher assessment.
“So there’s a number of different ways that teachers are utilizing those resources,” said Tuininga.
Meanwhile, 539 students said they utilized the ADLC to access courses not available in school, while 511 were dealing with timetabling and scheduling conflicts. Another 509 indicated they were dealing with a change in personal circumstances, like moving to a new school.
Between 438 to 445 students indicated they used ADLC resources for accelerated learning, needing more time to complete a course or because they were experiencing other challenges in their school.
A number of respondents also included personal comments with their survey. A principal with Medicine Hat Catholic wrote that losing the decades worth of teaching resources and assessments available through ADLC would be hard to imagine.
“Although we are a high school of about 500 students, ADLC programming is an important part of our course offerings to students. It allows us to offer diverse opportunities to our students on a budget,” they wrote.
A principal with the Prairie Rose School Division also wrote that the ADLC helped fill critical gaps in programming.
“Not only does ADLC provide support to students, it also provides support to teachers by providing every teacher in the province with access to resources without charge … These materials are an excellent resource for educators,” they wrote.
Garbutt noted that both of those school divisions had been quoted in the media recently after a reporter reaching out to their senior administration to ask about the ADLC. Their response at the time was that the centre didn’t serve a vital function.
“It’s interesting that the information we’re getting from the people that are actually on site is contradictory with what the senior admin is telling us,” Garbutt said.
Course completions
Besides emphasizing that ADLC is a service unlike any other distance education school in Alberta, Tuininga’s presentation also sought to clarify some information given to Alberta Education on course completion rates.
Tuininga noted that during a March 4 teleconference with LaGrange and her staff, it was raised that ADLC’s course completion rates (ie. the number of students completing a course compared to the number who are registered for it) are low.
Tuininga said many distance education schools have a course completion rate of around 71 per cent, while ADLC’s is 46 per cent.
However, this is partly due to the fact that ADLC operates differently from other distance education schools, which would motivate students who register in a course to complete it.
Again, ADLC acts more as a resource for other schools, that are not charged fees for the centre’s services. Many students registered for an ADLC course only need parts of it due to a temporary absence; in fact, many students will never even submit a single assignment. In 2018-2019 alone, there were 6,165 students registered for an ADLC course by their school that never actually started it.
When those students are accounted for, ADLC’s course completion rate raises to roughly 66 per cent.
Tuininga pointed out, among the students who complete an ADLC registered course, 86.6 per cent achieve an acceptable standard and 27.4 per cent achieve a standard of excellence, which is several percentage points higher than the province in both cases.
As well, Tuininga stressed to van Dijken that the ADLC is a cost-effective resource that only takes up 0.17 per cent of the provincial education budget.
Finally, she also pointed out that the ADLC has assisted school divisions in times of major disasters, including the Slave Lake fire in 2011, the Calgary floods in 2013 and the Fort McMurray fire in 2016.
In fact, the ADLC is in discussions with Alberta Education about how they will assist schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. (Garbutt shared he had been approached earlier that morning about registering every teacher with the Calgary Board of Education within ADLC’s system.)
At the end of the presentation, trustee Jackie Carson asked if this material would be shared through social media or with the division’s partners. Garbutt replied it would be better to entertain that suggestion after his meeting with Corbould.
Trustee Judy Lefebvre also asked about MLA van Dijken’s reaction to the presentation.
Garbutt suggested that he thought the presentation raised some additional questions to bring back to Alberta Education, adding that he seemed surprised by some of the information.
Deputy chair Wendy Scinski added, “A lot of work went into the presentation for MLA van Dijken in a very short period of time, so kudos to all of those involved, because it was well-done.”
Ultimately, a motion was passed to accept the presentation for information.
