Caitlin Cleveland

Yes, please, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we've budgeted $110,000 for this project.

Mr. Speaker, when students have food security, they can focus on learning, growing, and participating within their school communities; and most importantly, on being kids. To help students succeed, the Government of Canada and the Government of the Northwest Territories are working towards signing a three-year funding agreement that will support the expansion of the NWT school food program: Healthy Food for Learning.

Once signed, this new agreement will provide a significant and important boost to the program, creating real results for students and families across the territory. Since 2015, the...

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following document: Operating Plans for Northwest Territories Education Bodies for the 2024-2025 School Year Ending June 30th, 2025. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, to my left I have James Fulford who is the deputy minister of Education, Culture and Employment. And to my right I have Terri-Lynn Locke-Setter who is the assistant deputy minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we've learned from since -- as the assistant deputy minister informed the House, this process starts well in advance of us sitting here today and so there is quite a bit of lead time. And the school in Fort Providence has informed us that, in fact, they do not need the fencing that was previously identified. And so those dollars have actually -- and the Member, as well as yourself, Mr. Chair, will probably go back to your computers this evening and find an email from myself that was sent earlier today. But those dollars are looking to be reallocated...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, absolutely. So, first of all, I think this is a good place to remind the House that the bulk of the dollars received from the federal government for Indigenous languages flow through the Department of Education, Culture and Employment right to Indigenous governments for language programming. ECE is also actively partnering with four education bodies across the territory to pilot the Indigenous languages instructor employment program. And the aim of this program is to recruit and develop Indigenous language instructors for the JK to 12 age group, and this is...

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, that project is projected to be completed within the 2026-2027 school year.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's the programs that I've mentioned that are funded through the literacy council. There's also work that's done through Aurora College on the adult literacy and basic education skills program, and ECE also funds the college to make sure that they're maintaining that curriculum. There's also indirect funding through other departments. For example, health has funded family cooking activities and such, and those have an indirect literacy involvement as well. People are coming together, they're reading recipes together. And so there are also...

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. So our capital standards were updated in 2020. A lot of our school buildings predate 2020. And our capital standards apply to new builds in the territory that will follow that standard but it doesn't mean that all of a sudden we -- we would never be able to, for example, tear down every school in the territory and start over. So we have to start from somewhere. So the schools that have been built post 2020 would follow those capital standards. Thank you.