Rocky Mountain Goat News

The Rocky Mountain Goat Newspaper asked trustee candidates to respond to four questions. I thought I'd publish my responses here as well as to the paper.

Here are their questions:

1. What makes you a good candidate?
2. What are the big issues facing the school board and Robson Valley?
3. What is your vision for rural schools?
4. Anything else you want to add?

Here are my responses:

1. I have high expectations. For the last three years I have tried to raise the game for everyone involved in student success. I have worked for healthy caring schools and good relationships between all partner groups. I talk regularly with teachers, principals, other staff, and parents about what it going on in the district, especially where there is dysfunction. I have fought for transparent governance, asked tough questions of management and others, and refused to simply rubber stamp motions. Although I respect my fellow trustees, this usually puts me in the minority, often 1 out of 7.
2. Main issues: A) inclusive decision making - a Strategic Plan is coming up, I would like to see this be an open-ended consultation about the future, not a confirmation of what has already been decided. B) high expectation for leadership - the board needs to assert its right to set more directions in the district: budgets, programs, and hiring of management. Both the board and senior administration need to do more to follow-up on problems and opportunities. C) infrastructure improvements - many of our schools are in need of big repairs, environmental upgrades, and playground renewal. We should invest in geothermal heating, solar power panels, and planting more trees. Technology infrastructure needs attention, too, including the many restrictions that schools face on purchasing.
3. For rural schools, I would prioritize site-based management. Too many aspects of budgets and program direction are controlled centrally, with the result that rural school needs are sometimes put on the back burner and the "conversation on rural education" takes forever. My impression is that we use temporary measures to equalize opportunities for rural vs urban students. What we need is for rural communities to develop a more long-term site plans including better distributed learning and for the school district to support them.
4. Trustees are expected to be advocates. I am in favour of a more aggressive yet still respectful stance towards the government, more than just strongly worded letters. We should be building a restoration budget to be submitted along with our balanced budget to show the province what sustainable funding looks like. Our district and region is an awesome place to live and go to school. School boards need high expectations, strong voices, good listeners, blunt honesty, and caring leadership to ensure that we meet student needs in the future. That's what I offer.

Questions staff, parents, and students should ask trustees

We are coming up to a School Board election on November 15th.  Here are some questions that I've thought of and some that have been suggested to me. Feel free to contact me if you have some more.

1. Why bother voting in local elections? What difference does it make?
2. Why is BC behind other provinces when it comes to funding? What has our school board done to show the need for stable funding from the province besides write some letters?
3. Why are our playgrounds so sparse? What would it take to get more trees planted or more variety in the landscaping and playspaces?
4. Are all of our partner groups (teachers, principals, support staff, etc.) free to advocate for their schools, students, and public education or do they have restrictions placed on them? How has the school board engaged these partners? Will the new Strategic Plan address this?
5. Why are so many busses so empty? What are some creative ideas for rethinking how to meet student transportation needs?
6. When is a school too big? How are we planning for the future? Should any of our closed schools re-open?
7. Why are iPads a banned purchase by schools for use with staff and students? How are we actually supporting site-based management and innovation?
8. How come new programs come and go without any data being collected about how they work and whether they are worth it? Do we have accountable spending?
9. What has been done to give rural schools the same learning opportunities as urban schools? How are we engaging their parents, students, staff, communities and the regional district?
10. What are we doing to speed up diagnosis of special needs students and the added funding that comes with it? Do we have enough support staff such as occupational therapists, psychologists, and speech pathologists to deal with the needs in our schools?
11. The new teacher contract has an Education Fund to hire more specialist teachers, will this meet the needs of students? How will we find out if we need more counsellors, learning assistance teachers, teacher-librarians and so on?
12. Does our school district website do enough to celebrate the good work that happens in our school district especially with the focus of the Canada Winter Games coming to Prince George?

Re-election Press Release

I have great expectations for our school district. I want more transparency and accountability from senior management. I want more follow-through and boldness from trustees. I want more celebration and voice for the work of teachers. I want more awareness of what our support staff do to improve schools and learning. I want more engagement of parents and students as stakeholders in public education. I want the provincial government to acknowledge that we have unmet needs in our students due to underfunding, understaffing, and aging infrastructure that needs investment. I do not believe that these expectations are out of reach for the Board of Education. I do believe these are goals that we can achieve if we work together.

My record:

• Asked for a Restoration Budget to be submitted along with our balanced budget in order to show the provincial government and the public what a fully-funded education system looks like.
• Supported a stand-alone LGBTQ anti-bullying policy from the start of my term. While initially alone, thankfully other trustees came around to this position when it came up last year.
• Challenged each and every budget and district report when it did not meet high standards for inclusion of partner group input, unanswered questions about money or direction, slippery statistics, or clearness of expression.
• Successfully won the release of information from our district that should be public such as enrollment and demographic data, class composition reports, and school transfer information.
• Pushed for more of our committee meetings to lift partner group gag orders and for stakeholders to be part of budget consultations.
• Advocated for less restrictions on technology and innovation, and for paying attention to the impact that new technology has on the time and work of staff, like new student information systems.

What I am not:
A politician, polished public speaker, or someone who only speaks up when the wind is blowing in that direction. I do not vote with the majority just because I am expected to, I treat each motion on its own and vote to represent all stakeholders, not just management recommendation.

What I am: 
Someone who will ask tough questions, follow through on issues, and advocate for well-funded, caring, and effective schools for our staff and students.  I will listen to what all parties say and ensure their voices do not get lost in procedures and closed-door meetings.

What to expect from me next:

I do not ride the fence on issues (I'm sorry to say this has been a bog issue for our current board), and I am not shy about controversy although I am a shy person.  I am hoping that our new board deals with sustainable funding, support for rural education, reducing cost of bussing, condition of school grounds, improvements for special needs students, and more site-based management.

More about me: 

I'm a mother of two kids in SD57 elementary schools, married to teacher, and an employee at Northern Health. I do pottery in my spare time. I was born in Nova Scotia, raised in Saskatchewan and other places (military family), and have lived in Prince George since 1998. I have served one term as a trustee in SD57 from 2011-2014. 

Feel free to contact me by text/phone (7783499119) or email (trusteecooke@gmail.com) if you want more information, would like to share your thoughts about public education, or have concerns that need to be brought forward. 

I would like my next post to be about questions that staff, parents, and students would like answered. Please contact me if you have some good questions.

Running again

It wasn't until late last night that I decided whether or not I should run again for school board trustee in School District 57. I had to work through some serious pros and cons, talk to some friends, and figure out what I valued about being a trustee. The case for saying yes became clearer over the course of the evening. I have big expectations for our school system and believe I can make a difference in my own way.

I am not your typical trustee. I do not want to be a politician, and I don't enjoy being in the spotlight. I struggle with public speaking and even writing in a clear fashion, although this has improved a lot over the last three years. I have a problem with truth, meaning that I stick to it and will not lie or bend the facts when it is convenient. I will always say what is on my mind and do not have the ability to bullshit people. This means I can be very blunt in what I say in both closed and public meetings. I often believe in underdogs and pay attention to what people on the edge of conversations are doing or saying. 

Over the last three years, this means I have asked tough questions at every single meeting I have been at, even to the point of being cut off or "handled." I have pushed for accountability and transparency in our district, especially from senior management, and pushed for the input of partner groups to be taken seriously. We have a secretive district and many issues brought up by staff, so I felt that this was job number one for a trustee.  I started out trying to represent teachers, parents, principals, support staff, PEA (like psychologists), and students first, and did not start out simply accepting that senior management has all the answers. 

This also means I have usually been on the losing end of votes. In 2011, I was 1 out 7 in wanting a stand alone LGBTQ policy for our district. Eventually the other trustees agreed this was necessary. I have twice been 1 out of 7 in looking for a restoration budget. This is a needs-based budget that would be submitted along with the balanced budget in order to show the provincial government what full funding would look like in our school district. The request did not even make it to the board table. I have been 1 out of 7 in challenging the District Achievement Contract and related reports because they did not meet high standards and contained invalid interpretation of statistics. I have been in the minority in voting against three annual budgets because they did not do enough to incorporate partner group input and one of them spent money we were told would not be spent. I was the only one at first to ask for class composition data to be included in the superintendent's report, eventually this passed. I pushed for a closer look at student information systems when it seemed our district was ready to just jump in on the Ministry of Education's suggested choice. I pushed for less restrictions on technology and innovation in our district in response to year of complaints that these areas were being ignored. There were also editing suggestions for letters to the government, many of which were too strong to make it into the final version, and multiple motions related to transparent release of information, some of which passed.

This list could go on for a while, it is part of the hard work that I did and will continue to do if elected. My work is not very flashy and may not seem that exciting to the average voter in an election, but it is important work. Without this kind of work being done by one or more trustees, a board can quickly becomes a rubber stamp and we lose accountability and transparency.

The last three years wasn't all an uphill battle. Our board has done some good work and there has been great discussions and laughter along the way. Generally the debate has been respectful, although many issues have come and gone without actually dealing with them. The good discussion doesn't always translate into good votes on issues. I am encouraged by the feeling that partner groups have had an increased voice, but we have a long way to go.

I really hope our board can learn from the last three years, and that some new trustees can bring energy to make some needed changes. My goal for the next term is seek high expectations for the board, for senior management, and for partner groups in School District 57.

I guess that can be my campaign slogan: Great Expectations