REGINA - After spending the past week on funding woes facing public education, this week the opposition New Democrats are turning their attention back to Qualified Independent Schools.
On Tuesday, Opposition leader Carla Beck and Education Critic Matt Love called a press conference at the Legislature in which they distributed heavily-redacted copies of reports on the government-appointed administrators’ investigation into Legacy Christian Academy, Grace Christian School and Regent Christian Academy. The investigations had followed revelations of abuse at the Legacy Christian Academy last August.
“What they reveal is a government that was completely dishonest when they characterized the oversight that was occurring in these schools,” said Beck.
“These reports show that, in addition to reports of abuse, there were clearly many concerns around financial matters, and the following of provincial curriculum. They showed that there was a surplus revenue fund created once the Sask Party began funding these schools, and the clear lack of oversight and proper financial recordkeeping. And what’s infuriating is that the minister (Education Minister Dustin Duncan) was asked about this during committee by our Education Critic Matt Love and the minister basically denied these concerns.”
During their Tuesday news conference, the Opposition claimed that one administrators' report pointed to one school having openly discriminated against students with disabilities or special needs during the admissions process.
The Opposition also claimed that another school had amassed a considerable surplus of taxpayer dollars, while schools in the public and Catholic systems were drawing down reserves.
The Opposition was also critical that Qualified Independent Schools received an increase in funding of 25 per cent in the provincial budget, to $11,777,000. By contrast, they pointed to schools in the public and Catholic systems getting a 0.7 per cent increase, according to Saskatchewan School Board Association numbers.
“How is that fair?” Love asked Minister Duncan during Question Period that afternoon.
In response, Duncan pointed out that public schools were getting $2.04 billion dollars, plus $50 million for preventative maintenance, and $150 million to build new public schools.
Meanwhile, QIS schools were getting “$17 million dollars, to allow for parents to have a choice,” which were funded at 50 per cent of what the public system receives.
Love then pointed to the reports’ allegations of discrimination in admissions and of multiple concerns about curriculum and teaching materials at another school.
In response Duncan pointed out that in the Legacy lawsuit that had been filed, many of the abuse claims in that suit had happened while the NDP was in power.
“I think we need to be very careful about casting dispersions, Mr. Speaker, in terms of who did what when,” Duncan said.
Duncan then pointed to remarks from Assistant Deputy Minister Mike Walter in committee two weeks earlier.
He quoted him as saying: “‘Overall, I was confident that the students were receiving instruction that was in line with Saskatchewan curriculum. During my time I was to go through all the resources and see if there were resources that were considered significantly inappropriate. I never did find one I removed or asked to be removed from the school.’ Mr. Speaker, that comes from a highly, highly respected educator in this province.”
“Then I’m going to challenge the Minister, make those reports public,” responded Love. “What we have is heavily redacted information.”
“First and foremost, I don’t know how it worked under the NDP, but that’s not how it works, Mr. Speaker,” Duncan responded.
“I, as a minister, don’t choose what gets redacted, what doesn’t get redacted. Mr. Speaker, that would be highly inappropriate. In fact, Mr. Speaker, these reports that the member opposite refers to — they may contain information related to personal information of a student. As an educator, does he think that that’s appropriate that I as a minister would unredact that information?”
In speaking to reporters afterwards, Duncan pointed to regulation changes that they had moved on this year, such as ensuring there were lines of division between the parent organization (ie. a church, for instance) and the school organization; ensuring the Principal of the school was not also a member of the Board; financial reporting and so on.
“Remember, when we first made the regulation changes last year, that was before the administrators were in place,” said Duncan.
He said the regulation changes that were made subsequently came after the administrators have been in place. "Certainly their work in the schools on the day-to-day activity, that’s really what they, I think, noted in terms of the differences that they saw between their experience in a public school division setting, versus in an independent school, was really around some governance issues. So that’s really what the conversation has been like."
Also, on the issue of not accepting students with special needs, "I think that those schools would likely disagree that that's the case," said Duncan. Their argument would be, he said, "if you want us to accept all students regardless of their needs then let us into the EA fund which they don't have access to, let us into the capital fund, which they don't have access to, and increase our funding. So there's tradeoffs on both sides."
In response to what he heard from Duncan in the Assembly, Education Critic Love said he "heard a lot of spin from the Minister of Education, a lot of deflection. Didn't hear any responsibility."
"Quite frankly, the state of our public education system right now falls squarely on his shoulders, that we need to see thousands of people show up here on a Saturday demanding better, and have no indication that we're going to get that yet from this Sask Party government."
