Caitlin Cleveland

Mr. Speaker, I don't have any information at my fingertips right now as far as the you know, when these things will appear in the capital. I would love to get an update on that for committee, and I can commit to doing so. But, really, there's a lot of steps that need to happen before we end up with a bricks and mortar institution anywhere in the territory in addition to what we have right now. I know that in speaking to the board governors, their prime focus right now is student housing. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, at this point there have been a few delays in the project, and it's anticipated that there will be a delay in the May 2025 launch date that was originally published. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it would really be up to the college to let me know what their needs are versus what they're receiving from the department. As I have not received a request for additional funding in any formal capacity at this point, it's hard for me to speak to whether or not they have the resources that they need and what those additional resources might be.

In addition to the $8 million from the federal government, the $1 million a year over the last four years as well from the GNWT, there was also the staffing of the eight positions that did a substantial...

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's other programs within the government that I think would really welcome a million dollars a year in order to run a transformation and to run a program. So currently, the Government of the Northwest Territories is giving $1.04 million to Aurora College. At this point, I have not had communication from the board of governors as to a requirement for additional dollars, but if they do provide me with that request, I would definitely sit down and talk to them about it.

The other piece of this is when you are at arm's length and you are working...

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Member for the question. So in the life of transformation, Education, Culture and Employment has funded an Aurora College transformation team of eight public servants who helped do a lot of the work in conjunction with Aurora College getting ready for this transformation of which has three phases, and there are roughly 80 milestones in that project and 66 of those were completed by the transformation team. The federal government kicked in $8 million for transformation, and, in addition to that, this government also put in $1 million a year...

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I think that it's fair to say that given the investment of dollars from the GNWT into the Aurora College transformation, along with the investment of dollars from the federal government into the transformation, that there are many people that want to see this happen. There's also a number of people who are sitting on the board who have said they are passionate about seeing this happen. It's also worthwhile acknowledging that the positions through the Aurora College transformation also came from the surplus of Aurora College. Aurora College carries...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, ECE allots funding to each education body using the school funding framework. This framework allocates funding equitably and, outside of prescribed funds, allows flexibility to accommodate local decisionmaking. I will say, Mr. Speaker, there is absolutely more and more demand for dollars within our education system and one of the tasks that's been afforded to me this term is to work on the Education Act, along with our partners, and the school funding formula will be a part of that work. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in March of 2022 I delivered a similar Member's statement on the sorry, reading being a privilege, and or sorry, not being a privilege and being a human right. Jeez, I need to focus here, sorry. And so yes, Mr. Speaker, I've considered the importance of literacy, and I share the Member's concerns.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's been routine reviews of this program over the years, and it's one that the department keeps a close eye on knowing how important it is to seniors across the territory. In addition, in the last two years there have been one time topups acknowledging the additional cost of fuel across the territory and how that has an impact to seniors. And so ECE's been able to by kind of taking dollars from other programs, put them into this program to be able to serve seniors as best as possible. That being said, Mr. Speaker, I will also continue to work to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate this question because I think it's important for everybody to hear. If something goes to an MLA and comes to me and then from me, it goes to a deputy minister and down the chain and then makes its way to the school board and then to the school, I really encourage people to start by having these conversations with the school about what their child needs. If they're not getting a response from the school, all of our schools have education bodies with elected officials that are there to serve our residents as well. If an education body is...