The Alberta School Boards Association (ASBA) is calling on the provincial government to re-think providing public funding for private schools.
According to ASBA Vice President Mary Martin, $248 million in public funding budgeted to go to private schools in the 2016/2017 school year could be better used to improve the public education system.
“We believe that public dollars should support public (educational) options for our kids,” she said. “We recognize also that the mandates of this government are ones we can all support – reduction of fees, nutrition programs, a variety of things that would be helpful for our kids – and I think it’s a fair question to consider if the quarter of a million dollars that are currently expended on private models of education would be better re-deployed to the public system to help deal with some of the shortfalls.”
For the 2016/2017 school year, private schools will receive $248 million in public funding, a 2.5 per cent increase from 2015/2016. That doesn’t sit well with the ASBA, Martin said.
Some of the issues faced by the public school system the ASBA said could be alleviated by more funding include increasing class sizes and school fees, nutrition programs and modernizing existing or building new schools.
In 2013, the ASBA approved a policy, which states, “in order to build a viable, sustainable, equitable public education system, public funding currently provided to private schools should be reallocated to public education.”
According to Martin, members of the ASBA executive felt it was time to reaffirm that policy statement.
“The statement was really a response to Motion 504 by MLA Ric McIver, which stated that there should be support for parental choice – which is certainly important for all of us in regards to public, private and charter schools,” she said. “At ASBA we certainly support choice in education. It’s what makes Alberta strong. We believe we have incredible choice within the publically funded option.”
According to Martin, the face of education is changing as children arrive in the public systems from a variety of circumstances, including a recent influx of Syrian refugees.
“Our English Language Learners kids are in need of support. We have kids coming to us in particularly fragile states and their education needs need to be supported as well,” she said. “There are increasing pressures, financially, to provide the resources that they need. (The Syrian kids) need to be supported and their needs are extraordinarily complex.”
The Airdrie Koinonia Christian School (AKCS), a private school in the city’s northwest, receives public funding, according to Spokesman Ron Smith.
“Yes, we do receive some government funding. It accounts for about 50 per cent of what a student in the public system would receive, which essentially means parents, who are paying tuition, are subsidizing the cost of education for those children,” he said. “We’re very thankful for the partnership we have with Alberta Education and we definitely want funding to continue.”
According to Smith, groups like ASBA are basing their stand on public funding for private schools, not on the facts.
“If they’d just do the numbers, they’d realize there’s a huge advantage to Alberta Education funding private schools in Alberta,” he said. “It’s actually saving the government money not costing them money.”
Smith points to a statement released April 13 by the Association of Independent Schools and Colleges of Alberta to substantiate this claim. That statement includes a comparison of the cost to taxpayers for a student in the public system – $10,874 per year – versus the cost to the taxpayers for a student in the private school system – $5,150 per year, with tuition paid by parents making up the difference.
The ASBA is calling on the government to make all costs of a private education born by the parents with no funding coming from taxpayers.
Parents of students enrolled at AKCS pay $5,700 per year for the first child, $5,250 for the second child, $1,400 for the third, and the fourth child or more are free. Families requiring assistance to pay those fees can access the school’s tuition assistance program, which Smith said can fund up to 100 per cent.
Part of ASBA’s stand on public funding for private schools includes ensuring all students – including those for whom a private school education is out of reach, financially – receive the best education.
“We offer an incredible breadth (of programs and education) that is designed to keep all of our kids engaged,” Martin said. “They are a model that is within reach of every student within Alberta.”
