Feedback on School District 57’s budget for the 2025-26 focused on more resources to be provided for staffing, mental health supports and more money spent in the classroom instead of on administrative expenses.
The Board of Education gathered at the district’s administration building at 2100 Ferry Ave. in Prince George on Tuesday, April 29 to go over input from unions, partner groups, staff and members of the public in a meeting of the committee of the whole.
Board chair Craig Brennan was not present at the meeting and vice-chair Erica McLean led the meeting. Trustees Cory Antrim and Rachael Weber were not present, while Trustee Bob Thompson joined the meeting remotely.
District administration’s initial draft budget for the next school year, which was presented at the April 8 board meeting, proposed operating costs of around $108 million, special purpose funds of around $21.8 million and capital costs of just over $10 million.
At the beginning of the evening, secretary-treasurer Lynda Minnabarriet explained to trustees that the purpose of the meeting was to allow them to ask questions on feedback collected through the budget process.
Starting off the discussion, Trustee Sarah Holland noted that much of the feedback received by the district was about staff recruitment and retention.
Supt. Jameel Aziz explained that while the Northern Interior Branch of the BC School Trustees Association has been advocating to the province that more funding is needed for recruitment and retention, there’s no increase to the district’s line items for those purposes in this year’s budget.
Holland also asked about an expressed desire for more student funding supports expressed in the feedback, especially relating to mental health.
Aziz said the budget for mental health, wellness and counselling supports remains the same as in the 2024-25 school year budget.
He noted that there had been some consideration given to removing a mental health and wellness position in Valemount in last year’s budget, but the board had ultimately decided against making that cut.
However, he said he believes a future discussion is needed on the financial sustainability of that position.
Trustee Shar McCrory brought up the “astronomical” number of letters of permission being applied for. Those letters, if approved, allow unlicensed teachers who have not received teacher training to work in a school district or for a First Nations council for up to a year at a time.
According to Aziz, the issue of unlicensed teachers is an issue for the entire northern interior region. He said many of these people would like to eventually become certified teachers and there are conversations with post-secondary institutions to offer more online opportunities to allow that to happen.
While a provincial agency has added extra staff hours to help process these letters, Aziz said it’s not a problem that school districts are in a place to rectify.
Though the school district has a surplus this year, there is no guarantee that there will be another next year. Because of that, he said he doesn’t want to see surplus funds spent on ongoing items, but one-time expenses.
“I don’t want to start something that we can’t complete,” Aziz said.
The superintendent said that School District 57 not having to make cuts this year is a luxury borne out of costs and financial prudence instituted last year.
In the original 2025-26 draft budget, there was a projected surplus of around $300,000. Now that the board has decided to close Giscome Elementary School at the end of the year, a staff report said the expected surplus has risen to around $600,000.
The district is also projecting a surplus of around $1.2 million for the 2024-25 school year.
Holland said colleagues with the British Columbia School Trustees Association told her that they were having difficult conversations with their constituents about cuts in their communities.
She said she saw in the budget survey that some people have a perception that too much is being spent on administrative expenses in this year’s draft budget.
Aziz said he wanted to clarify that though the document talk about “public” feedback, more than 50 per cent of respondents to the district’s survey were submitted by staff and that should be kept in mind when looking through the results.
He reiterated that he didn’t want to use surplus dollars to establish ongoing expenses, instead using them for one-time expenses like the purchases of new computers or painting district buildings.
He also said there probably isn’t a good understanding of the structure and workings of school district administrations not just locally, but across the province.
Referencing the draft budget, Holland asked whether that meant that proposed staffing enhancements were no longer being recommended.
In the initially proposed draft budget, administration had suggested $650,000 worth of budget enhancements for the board to consider.
That included a 0.5 full-time equivalent position to add a vice-principal position leading curriculum and innovation, a full-time equivalent teaching position for a district lead in technology in learning and a full-time equivalent leadership position for Indigenous education, which would have cost the district an estimated $436,000.
The superintendent confirmed these items were no longer included on administration’s list of enhancements, which instead focuses on one-time expenditures. An updated list of recommendations was not made publicly available at the meeting, but staff said it would be in time for the next board meeting in May where the budget is deliberated.
McCrory asked Aziz what the district could do better to recruit and retain staff.
He said there had been some “solid” suggestions from the district union partners, but that it would require external funding from the provincial level to implement.
It’s important, he said, to show the public that School District 57 is stable after negative events in recent years. He said he thinks that public perception is changing for the better and it would help potential staff consider opportunities within the district.
Last month, Aziz said, he met with the district’s principals. Part of that discussion was regarding the challenges facing rural schools, like only being able to offer certain courses every two years instead of every year.
Holland asked what the district is doing to improve funding to rural schools.
At the high school level, Aziz said there’s a different allocation for full-time equivalent positions at urban and rural schools because rural schools tend to have fewer students and a lower student-to-staff ratio.
He said he believes rural schools in the district have the resources to offer strong core programming.
Minnabarriet chimed in to say that she doesn’t think it can be underscored enough that SD57 isn’t having to make the same kind of difficult funding decisions its peers in other parts of the province are, thanking staff for making that possible.
Holland said for those listening into the meeting that she believes the provincial government needs to provide more funding to school districts.
McCrory said she thought BC needs to revise its funding formula for education, though she felt the district isn’t doing enough to meet students’ needs with what it is currently given.
She added that she thought the feedback received from the public and from partner groups should be considered as the board deliberates the budget in May.
Aziz said that last year, when the district was facing severe cuts, there was more than 900 individual pieces of feedback. This year, there were around 100.
“It’s very clear to me that when things are being proposed to be eliminated or reduced or removed, then we hear a lot of public voice,” Aziz said. “I would suggest that the feedback received this year does suggest that people perhaps do not have the same level of concern.”
In difficult times, Minnabarriet said, people look to prioritize what is most important. She said she thought the district needing to go through that exercise in previous years was a valuable experience, though a painful one at times.
Thompson said that approach should be taken every year, even if there is a surplus, as there will never be enough money to do everything and it allows the district to get the best bang for its buck.
As the board heads into budget talks at its next regular meeting on Tuesday, May 13 at 5 p.m., McLean said she was getting the impression from trustees that nothing was off the table for how the district’s surplus would be spent.
For that meeting, Holland said she’d like to see more information on what the district could do to save for the future.
Attached to the meeting’s agenda was feedback from members of the public as well as partner organizations like CUPE 3742, the District Parent Advisory Council, the District Student Advisory Council, the Prince George District Teachers Association, the Prince George Principal and Vice Principal Association and the Prince George Metis Association.
A letter written by CUPE 3742, the union representing the district’s support staff, starts off by saying that their turnover “is staggering.”
“Over 100 employees left their positions in the past year alone, far outpacing the district’s ability to replace them,” the letter said. “This level of turnover disrupts students support and places immense strain on remaining staff.”
The union notes that the district acknowledged a similar problem in October 2005.
Between five to 10 violent incidents are reported by CUPE members every day, the letter said.
This situation poses a problem for maintaining adequate staffing levels and creates a financial impact on the district.
“In the past four years, the district has spent over a million dollars on claims for time loss injuries due to violence-related incidents,” the letter said. “This is more than just a financial burden — it’s a clear indication that we are failing to provide a safe and sustainable working environment.”
The letter asks the district to be more proactive on this front, spending more on staffing for its most vulnerable students and to prevent staff from becoming injured in the first place. It also criticized the district for eliminating five CUPE positions from last year’s budget and considering, though not going through with reductions to clerical hours.
As the district’s lowest-paid employees, the union said that many of its members are forced to juggle many jobs to afford basic necessities.
The letter concludes with CUPE 3742 requesting that employee hours be expanded to include before- and after-school support for students, prioritize staff retention, ensure that its staff are paid a living wage and commit to local schools’ long-term sustainability.
The next letter was from the District Parent Advisory Council, which thanked the school district for improving its communication and for maintaining positive working relationships.
“Our priority is to see funding use that supports students equitably in both their academic and social emotional needs, as well as supports for those teaching/supporting students,” the DPAC letter said.
Writing a letter to the board on behalf of the District Student Advisory Council was Grade 12 student Keizya Cunningham of Shas Ti-Kelly Road Secondary.
She asked the board for funding for sports teams, fine arts and classroom resources, equity in elective courses for rural students, literacy supports, to keep student wellness a priority and for funding to improve funding for science equipment and field trips.
On elective courses, Cunningham said that DSAC members from rural communities have noted fewer options than their urban counterparts.
When it comes to reading, she said DSAC members participating in peer tutoring “have seen students struggle with reading, which impacts their success in all subjects.”
For field trips, Cunningham said they provide valuable experiences for students but transportation costs are a barrier for many schools preventing them from participating in them.
On behalf of the Prince George District Teachers’ Association, president Katherine Trepanier and first vice-president Sherrie Pearce made several requests.
They said that the district has cut its funding for a joint mentorship program to almost nothing and that their own union-funded program will run out of money at the end of the year. They asked for robust and proper funding for the initiative.
There are 57 members working on letters of permission, which the union said is the most they have ever had. These are for uncertified workers who have not received teacher training, with a letter allowing them to work in a particular school district or for a First Nations council for up to one school year.
The union asked for orientation, in-service and assistance support for these workers as well as new teachers, which it said 30 to 40 per cent of leave the profession in their first five years.
Other requests include service delivery increases at the district learning centre, increases to funding for sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) teacher leader positions, creation of an equity, diversity and inclusion teacher leader position, and additional resources or programming for maintaining a non-sexist work environment, SOGI and anti-racism, anti-discrimination and cultural safety efforts.
Prince George Principals and Vice Principals Association president Kelly Johanson identified three priorities the organization would like to see addressed in the budget.
The first was to maximize funding at the school level, second is to emphasize the importance of equity and the third was for a financial commitment to recruiting and retaining qualified teaching and support staff.
“The demand for qualified teachers and support staff remains high, with many vacancies in our schools,” Johansen wrote. “Addressing these shortages is important to ensuring students receive a quality education.”
There were also several letters from members of the public or public groups.
The Valemount Secondary School Parent Advisory Council Society wrote to express concern about “the much talked about reduction of school funding to rural schools, elimination of counselling positions and possible elimination of face-to-face instruction time for some classes.”
The society said the district isn’t transparent about how much rural school supplement money it receives from the province each year and how it is distributed.
“For every teacher, support worker and counselor that is ‘let go,’ our students lose the opportunity to take three to four courses,” the letter said.
“How are rural students expected to meet graduation requirements when a lack of teachers and therefore a lack of courses are barriers created direct by the SD57 school board? Online learning is not the solution, as many students rely on the structure and support of in-person school to help them stay on track with assignments.”
The district noted that there were 131 more pieces of correspondence about the budget directed to the district itself, the board of education, the Ministry of Education or a combination of the three.
The six examples attached to the agenda all expressed concern over rural funding cuts to schools in Valemount.
These letters bring up the potential negative consequences on students’ mental health should counselor positions be eliminated, difficulties in meeting graduation requirements due to a lack of available classes, lack of opportunities for students in Valemount to make extra-curricular trips due to insufficient funding,
“All of your proposed cuts will mean there will be more high school dropouts to rack up expenses for the social welfare, drug rehab & criminal justice systems,” read one unsigned letter.
“This is not acceptable. Rural schools have the right to the same opportunities as their urban counterparts, according to your own mandate! We the community of Valemount vehemently request that proposed rollbacks/cutback to our rural school budget be rescinded immediately.”
Also posted with the agenda was a summary of results from an online budget survey that had 101 responses. Of those responses, 46 were district staff, 39 were parents or guardians of a student, nine were community members, six were listed as “other” and one was a student.
Asked if they felt the district has been successful in supporting students to be successful with the draft budget, 84 per cent of respondents said no.
Respondents said they wanted the district to hire more education assistants and teachers, direct more funds to student support over administration costs and to provide more support for unique student needs.
However, 55 per cent of respondents said they agreed with the Board of Education’s budget focus on improving student equity.
Though the district is looking to achieve this through improvements to technology, some respondents were concerned that improvements would need more human support to be achieved while others said some students had inconsistent access to the resources they needed.
Asked to rank six budget initiatives from most to least important, respondents ranked them like this:
- Adding a new teacher position to provide support and professional development to teachers on the use of technology in the curriculum,
- More frequent repainting of school interiors,
- Adding a district leadership position focusing on Indigenous education,
- Repairing or replacing aging asphalt at school parking areas,
- Adopting interview scheduling software to help streamline the district’s recruitment processes and
- Increasing a leadership position supporting administration and educators in using data and technology to improve student outcomes from half-time to full-time.
Respondents also said more funding was needed for teachers, educational assistants and specialized support staff like counselors and speech therapists as well as school budget allocations, student resources, technology, Indigenous education initiatives and facilities maintenance and repair.
The May 13 board meeting is being held in Mackenzie, in the library of Mackenzie Secondary School. For those who cannot make the meeting in person, the meetings are livestreamed and the archived for future viewing on the school district’s website, sd57.bc.ca.
