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Perhaps the most devastating loss in the recent Vancouver civic election was the NPA School Board majority win, and the consequent turfing out of the respected, hard-working, centrist, consultative and initiative-driven majority COPE school trustee slate — Kevin Millsip, Noel Herron, Angela Kenyon, Jane Bouey, and Green Party trustee Andrea Reimer.
Even given the downloading, by the provincial Liberal government, of a teacher pay raise onto school boards throughout the province, the COPE School Board was the only Board in the province to not lay teachers off during their three-year term, and to maintain smaller class sizes (or in the case of kindergarten, reduce class sizes and go to full day kindergarten).
Unlike past COPE School Boards, the 2002 – 2005 COPE Vancouver school trustees did not pick unwinnable fights with the provincial government, but instead worked together with senior staff in the provincial Ministry of Education to secure additional funding for inner city schools for our region’s most vulnerable children; developed a programme to make all schools across our province seismically safe; expanded literacy programmes, and increased spaces for French Immersion; and developed groundbreaking multi-cultural, anti-racism and anti-homophobia programmes.
Why was the popular COPE School Board defeated? Easy question that. COPE school trustees fell victim to the infighting between COPE Classic and COPE Lite / Vision Vancouver, as slate voting took over to elect a majority NPA slate to the Vancouver School and Park Boards, and City Council.
A diverse NPA Council will be what it will be. Mayor-elect Sam Sullivan will set the agenda for his, and the NPA’s, coming term of office. The Park Board is, for the most part, a largely non-partisan (no pun intended) entity, a Board that tends to work co-operatively and without rancour; commissioners from COPE and the majority NPA Board will almost assuredly act in the best interests of Vancouver citizens, and citizens across the Lower Mainland.
But School Board? Children, parents, teachers, and non-teaching support staff are in for a rough ride with a Ken Denike-led NPA majority on the 2005 – 2008 Vancouver School Board. The NPA School Board will almost certainly prove to be a right wing, ultra-conservative and ideologically driven Board.
Likely first on the agenda of the newly elected NPA School Board majority will be the reversal of the recently adopted advertising policy, which sought to “shield students from corporate messages and a sponsorship policy.”
Next up, Vancouver citizens may expect the NPA to reverse the groundbreaking and successful anti-homophobia and anti-racism programmes implemented by the Board this past three years.
Vancouver parents are also likely to see a move towards privatization of the Vancouver school system, and partnerships with schools overseas, resulting in the transfer of funds designated for Vancouver students assigned to prop up fledgling School Board-run ‘private’ companies.
Potentially most damaging of all to the interests of children, parents and the cause of public education is a recently-announced proposal by the provincial Liberal government to eliminate locally elected school boards in favour of provincially appointed regional educational authorities, based on the same model as the regional health authorities. Where a COPE School Board would have fought vigorously to maintain local educational authority, it is entirely likely that the NPA School Board will simply roll over on that matter, with Mr. Denike lobbying the provincial government to become the first chair of a regional Lower Mainland / Fraser Valley education authority.
Make no mistake. Where the NPA Council and Park Board majorities might reasonably be seen as non-partisan and centrist, acting in the best interests of all of us who live in or near Vancouver, VanRamblings believes that the NPA school trustees (particularly Mr. Denike) will prove themselves to be ultra-conservative ideologues who will hue to the line of the Fraser Institute, in the process seeking to undo all of the hard fought for gains of the past three years — a modern day tragedy for our children, their parents and for any caring person committed to diversity, educational opportunity and responsive and responsible local educational decision-making.
