Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Follow-up to my Member’s statement, I have questions for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. I'd like to ask the Minister: what are the criteria to decide whether or not senior high school is offered to students in their home communities such as Tsiigehtchic? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to say that the department is committed to work with all of our communities to provide quality education programming for communities if they wish to do so from grades 10 to 12. In the case of Tsiigehtchic, the Members and myself would like to see the youth and the children stay in the community to get their education. What I would encourage the Member to do is to speak with the District Education Council, as well as the superintendent, to invite the superintendent into the communities to develop options into how we get grades 10 to 12 in the community of Tsiigehtchic. We do support those discussions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
That leads me up to my next question. Is this decision made by the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, or by the District Education Council, and are the parents consulted?
The Department of Education funds our education authorities to the tune of about $150 million every year. If the Member and the community and the parents wish to look at providing grades 10 to 12, I would encourage them to speak with the superintendents, as well as the DECs, to look at the possibility of providing that type of program in the community of Tsiigehtchic.
I'd also like to ask the Minister what options exist for students who want to stay in their home communities while finishing high school -- for example, Moodle, the program a previous Minister spoke about.
Obviously, we've been having some very successful results with the e-learning program that we have. We’ve brought it down now into some of the southern parts of the Northwest Territories. That's one option. Other options that the Member might want to look at when he's speaking in the community, or when the parents are speaking with the DEC and the superintendent, is possibly busing students to Fort McPherson, which is closer than going to Inuvik, and keeping them in their communities.
Masi. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
It sounds promising. Will the department or the Minister commit to providing funds to do busing of our students to either Fort McPherson or Inuvik?
---Laughter
At this time, we cannot commit funds to such an option.
Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife Centre.
