Jackson Lafferty

Again, that type of discussion needs to happen at the district education council with our department, identifying funding or resources within our department and also within the board department. We’ve already allocated funds for this school year operation, and those eight students or other students that Mr. Krutko is alluding to, we need to look at their status. The funding that’s been allocated to Inuvik, certainly they will lose that if the students are back in Tsiigehtchic. We need to adjust in those areas as well. The board needs to make those decisions as well. I have to respect those...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We are looking at various options on how we can enhance our services in small, isolated communities such as Tsiigehtchic or Sachs Harbour and Ulukhaktok and other communities. Part of the ongoing discussion we’re having with the education council is identifying those resources. There is also the enrolment issue. We’re dealing with an enrolment that is going down, and that doesn’t help in small communities. So, certainly, those are the strategic thinking that we are having with our departments and with the community organizations. We need to find a solution. One solution is...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it gets very complicated where we’ve allocated funds based on where the students are enrolled. So we do provide the funding. We do provide the service to those eight students the Member is referring to. It’s just a matter of choice that the students are back in the community. Again, the decision lies with the Beaufort-Delta Education Council to make that decision, and the district education authority. If they are exploring options of extending high schools, those are discussions that need to take place as well. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, regarding the high school students, as I stated in the House on numerous occasions, we want every student to succeed. We do provide funding to district education councils and the DEA that falls under them that deals with these matters. I have to respect their decision, as well as the boarding homes’ and so forth. But it would be under the direction of the Beaufort-Delta to make those decisions based on the funding that we provide to them. We’ll continue to work with the Beaufort-Delta Education Council as we move forward. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, safety is our first priority so we will definitely look at the playground this summer. Whether to remove that due to safety precautions, we certainly need to discuss that further with PWS. Mahsi.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. That particular school was brought to our attention just in December that their playground needs to possibly be replaced within a few months or a couple years. So those are the discussions that we continue to have with the Dehcho Board of Education, specifically with the superintendent, that has brought this to our attention. The focus is that we’re going through our budget planning process this period, but part of the planning process will be to put this into next year’s budget. Mahsi.

Mr. Speaker, that could be part of the key component of discussions that we can have on a going forward basis. I can certainly commit to consider that as part of the discussions that we could have. Like I said, we just did a review and another review could be undertaken down the road, but I can’t commit today when that is going to happen. But I will take that into consideration and work with the Members on that. Mahsi.

That is one area that we continue to focus on with our department. The client service officers take various training to deal with the subsidies, the program delivery, the client face-to-face interaction, public relations. That area can certainly be part of the training package that we continue to provide our services to client service officers as well. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, I definitely will commit to the Member to provide the information. As we move forward, we’re seeing some progress already that I will certainly share with the Members and we’re starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel. We’ve dealt with the enrolment issue and now we’re seeing progress. So we’ll certainly share more as they become available.

Mahsi. The process itself is working closely with the school boards, the school board council and the district level as well, because we provide funding to the organization to provide the operation and maintenance of the school and to deal with the students. Enrolment issues are becoming an issue, but at the same time we have provided funding just in the last several months, now we’re seeing some results, but it’s going to take some time, but we are progressing on the enrolment issue.

So, Mr. Speaker, that’s great news. Even though it’s just a short period since September, we are seeing...