Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When the Government of the Northwest Territories did a needs assessment in the Sahtu region, the number one issue with the results of that assessment was the literacy skills of our young students either in school or who have finished school.
What is the Minister doing, what is this department doing to improve the literacy in our small communities in the schools that can show great results by giving some resources to the teachers? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The Minister of Education, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. When it comes to educating our community members, obviously literacy plays a key role at the community level. We work closely with our partners, as well, the NWT Literacy Council. We provide funding on an annual basis and they work very closely with the community. They’re always in the communities promoting literacy, whether it be in schools or at the community level.
In the Globe and Mail article it talks about the Aboriginal Literacy Pilot Project that dramatically improved the test scores in Ontario. I wonder if the Minister is aware of this First Nations reserve school in Ontario. It was struggling with the basic literacy test scores, and they have done a pilot project in that community that has greatly improved the results of these test scores for the young students.
Is this something that the Minister would be interested to investigate and to see if this could be done in the Northwest Territories in looking at a pilot project in the Sahtu communities?
When it comes to literacy, we’ve made some changes. We’ve had some pilot projects in the South Slave region. We’ve had literacy coaches. It’s been very successful to date and we continue to use that as an example for other schools as well.
The pilot projects we’ve done over the years, so we’ve seen some results out of that. Within our Education Renewal and Innovation, this will obviously capture the literacy component, and we’ll be discussing further with our key stakeholders where we can best invest in certain areas, whether it comes to DECs or DEAs. They are our true partners, so we will continue to work with them.
When the government did a test in the schools, we found out, shockingly, that in our schools in our small communities, 50 percent are operating below their grade level. That’s shocking.
So, I want to ask the Minister again, with him probably not having the privilege of reading the Globe and Mail I received, to look at a pilot project in our communities that would increase these numbers here. They’re doing it at the Hillside School on the Kettle and Stony Point First Nation and Walpole Island Elementary School.
Is the Minister willing to look at this, investigate it and say yes, this could be done in our small communities? Because we’ve got to do better than 50 percent of our students. We’re failing.
I fully agree that we have to do better. That’s what we’re eyeing and focusing on in the Educational Renewal and Innovation. We want to make some changes along the way. Literacy coaches, as I stated before, have been very successful, and we want to capture that in other schools, as well, because we want our students to succeed throughout the Northwest Territories. Those are the discussions that we are currently having. We’ll continue to do so with our key stakeholders and our partners. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Mr. Speaker, it says in the paper, kids are not learning to read and write by Grade 3, and if you don’t learn to read and write by Grade 3, you’re handicapped all the way through. That’s what I’m talking about, and the results show that 50 percent of our small schools are operating below their grade level. We are failing them.
I’m asking the Minister again, is he willing to look at the pilot projects that are done in Ontario to see if these pilot projects can be implemented in our Sahtu communities as a pilot project to improve the literacy skills of our students? Will he be willing to commit to look at that?
We’re always looking for opportunities and ideas and suggestions. What the Member is referring to is a document that, if we can get our hands on – I’m assuming that he’ll be tabling the document at a later time – we can access and work with it. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Blake.
