Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There has been a lot of debate around junior kindergarten and much of that has to do with funding or the apparent lack of funding that is provided to educational authorities to implement this new program. Most of this criticism was around the funding and, I believe, not the merits of junior kindergarten itself. Again, my questions today will be for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
I think the burning question here today, and I think in the minds of many, is: Why did the Minister just not seek additional funding to pay for junior kindergarten?
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I guess simply put is that we don’t have the new funding available to us. I’ve been trying to get some actual numbers from Finance where our financial situation is and obviously we’re not in a positive in that regard. In a perfect world, obviously, we would be seeking additional funding, but since we don’t have that at this point, I had to work innovatively and creatively within our department, so that’s what we have done. We’ve reached out to the PTR that’s available to us. We’re still under our legislated level, so you’ll have to keep that in mind. We’re at that point.
I’m sure the Minister will receive more questions on this topic later today. I have heard the Minister say countless times, and many times, that the graduation rates in small communities have declined. This is a disturbing trend and I think everyone here is very concerned. All the more reason to avoid, in my humble opinion, diverting funding from K to 12 to junior kindergarten.
My question to the Minister of ECE is: How can graduation rates in these small communities be improved if ECE is just pulling away money from K to 12 and just putting it into junior kindergarten?
The Member for Inuvik congratulated 36 graduates, and that’s just one area that we should be proud of and we’ll continue to push that forward. An investment in JK is an investment in the K to 12 overall school system. That’s what we’re doing. Out of the $150 million that we distribute to the school boards, we’re using that funding to educate those individuals so that they can graduate and continue on to post-secondary.
Our research shows us that investment in early childhood of a child’s life has the greatest impact on their lifelong learning and part of their journey as children and grown-ups, and you know that 10 of our smallest communities do not have any education programming. Those are some of the investments that we’ll continue to do, and that means that parents who believe their children will benefit from quality programs for four-year-olds have no options. I believe we’re doing what we can to assist those individual communities.
I have listened carefully to the debate over the last few months and even today and have listened to constituents who are afraid that junior kindergarten will reduce the funding available to children with special needs especially requiring one-on-one attention.
My question to the Minister of ECE is as follows: Can you assure this House and the parents of the Northwest Territories that funding for students who require extraordinary assistance will not be affected through the implementation of junior kindergarten?
I can assure that will be the case. We’re inclusive schooling. The special needs that are provided to education authorities through what is called inclusive schooling and that funding will continue. We’re not touching the funding. We’re dealing with the PTR at this point to deal with the JK. Junior kindergarten implementation, obviously, will not take away from approximately $26 million in inclusive schooling funding that education authorities receive on an annual basis. The amount of inclusive requirement is the fact that it is set out in legislation, so we have to work with that as well. At the end of the day, we’re not even going near inclusive schooling on this particular subject, but we’re dealing with the PTR.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Final, short supplementary.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My last question to the Minister of ECE is: In light of all the confusion around junior kindergarten and the strong reaction we are getting from both parents and school boards, would it not be wise just to wait one more year to implement junior kindergarten and that maybe we’ll have more money in place so that we can work out all these problems?
There has been a lot of debate going back and forth between myself and the school board chairs and the school boards across the Northwest Territories. We’ve met just as recently as last month and I did listen to the school board chairs. We are going to have over 600 individual students registered over the two-year timespan. The fact is that 23 communities are ready to take on the role of JK. At the same time, I’ve been making some amendments to our initial stand where I provided optional junior kindergarten. At the beginning it was mandatory and everybody had to do it, but after listening carefully to the Members, I have decided that it will be optional. At the same time, I’ve allowed half-time as well as an option. At the beginning, at the get-go it was full-time. In those two areas I’ve allowed some flexibility and we’re making some changes along the way.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.
