Yes, we are developing these monitoring, evaluation, and accountability plans moving forward. There was widespread consultation and guidance from external experts on this when we were going through the ministerial directive on the inclusive schooling moving forward. The consultation was there. Obviously, moving forward, we do want to monitor how our programs are working. We have a lot of new initiatives. This is one of them, but we also have the Pathways to Graduation, early childhood development. All these programs that are in this section, we are going to make sure that we are following up and making sure that our education authorities and people that are running the programs are doing a good job. For more detail with the directive, I will go to the deputy minister, that I may have missed.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. We will recognize Deputy Minister Stewart.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. In terms of the Member's comments around the needs side, we actually just completed a project with the regional inclusive schooling coordinators, where they did an assessment of every kid in the Northwest Territories in terms of a variety of factors in terms of the needs they may have. They did a lot of work in advance of that to make sure there was consistency from region to region. It is probably the best snapshot we have had in a long time because it was the regional inclusive schooling coordinators working with teachers in the school to try to get a sense of the kinds of needs for all of our students as well as the nature of those needs in terms of severity and those types of things. That is really informing some of the next steps in this inclusive schooling work in terms of whether it is speech and language, whether it is trauma related, or other types of supports that might be needed. We are very happy with that. I think it starts the basis of looking at more of a needs-based approach. It is a challenge when you get into diagnosis in the small communities, but I think this is from the people that are working with those kids every day. I think it is actually a good set of overall data, and we should look at how we can do this on a fairly regular basis without becoming burdensome in terms of trying to do reporting. We are very pleased with that first effort. Thank, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Stewart. Mr. Thompson.
This will be my final question, I hope, on this section. I thank the deputy minister and the Minister on this. I think that it is very important to do a needs-based assessment. I would hope that we do it yearly so that we can continue to see that we are meeting the needs. The other thing is, are you guys going to be doing reports and, are you going to be sharing that with committee so that we can see the progress in the work that the department is doing and from there. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Thompson, I am going to recognize a closing answer.
Yes, we will be developing reports, and we will share that with committee. I am sure the residents of the North would like to get information on that. With our early childhood, in terms of monitoring, we do have an Early Development Instrument that reflects how children are going into the K to 12 system. What we have developed now is an MDI, Middle Development Instrument, which is pretty neat in the sense that all these students that went through the EDI are now just going into this year and will now develop on the end, looked at on the MDI. We will see what improvements have been made and how we can continue to support those and develop those.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Moving on. Mr. Nakimayak.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, my question is I see that the second to last point, schools for $128,914,000. I would just like a breakdown of that. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Nakimayak. Mr. Minister.
Those are our education authorities. We give out funding every year. Then it is distributed to the schools. We can get a breakdown for each of the regions if the Member would like, or if he wants to know what the schools are getting from the education authorities, we can get that information. To my assistant deputy for the breakdown and the real numbers.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Recognizing Mr. Lovely.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. What we have right now is a breakdown of the school funding that we provide to education authorities for inclusive schooling, the school funding for territorial schools, and the amount that we provide for Aboriginal languages. The total amount that we will be providing to schools this year is about $149 million. The balance of that, the $2 million, will be provided to education authorities based on actual disbursements that they incur during the year. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Lovely. Mr. Nakimayak.
Thank you. That clarified. And also the other Member had asked the questions that I was looking for earlier. Thank you.
Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a few points on this page that I would like to get clarification for. On item “education operations and development,” in the 2014-15, under actuals, there was a significant pot of about $9,158,000. The last couple of years it seemed significantly reduced. This year, $2,282,000. Can the Minister give a little explanation on what education operations and development is and why the significant decrease over the last couple of years? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Minister.
For that question and amount of detail I will go to our deputy minister.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Deputy Minister Stewart.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The amount in 2014-15 is quite large because of the cost of litigation related to residential schools. It was a one-time expenditure that we had to pay out on the residential school amounts. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Stewart. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am happy to see that inclusive schooling has a little bump up. If we go under expenditure category and again this is contract services. This is a category that always gets questions. We have seen from 2014-15 actuals to the estimated amount for 2016-17, it is nearly a $3 million increase. Can the department describe for us what they are projecting to be needing contract services for this year and why such a significant increase in the last couple of years? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Minister.
Thank you. As we are going through our Education Renewal and Innovation Action Plan and running some pilots in some of the communities, that is the amount there that is covering those pilots and some of the work that we are doing with the education and renewal. The budget that we do have fits the work that we do need to do moving forward this fiscal year. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't know if this is the time or place to ask this question. Because this seems to get raised all the time, virtually within every division of every department, we always have questions around the contracted services. Is there a way in which Members have the opportunity to see whether it's on, you know, some form of database that Members can see what departments have put out for contracted services and to whom and for what amounts? That would be greatly appreciated. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The government tables a report every year, of contracts over $5,000, and it has all the information in there I believe for all departments. I think when that report comes out it might be something that the Member would like to take a look at.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. To be honest, I think I knew about that, but I do appreciate the Minister's reply. Thank you again. That's all I have for this page right now, thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Recognizing Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I'd like to ask the Minister at what grade EDI applies?
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Minister.
For anybody that went through the EDI… It's great news because now they're going to be… The first group of kids that took the EDI assessment will now go through another assessment and that's grade four. Eventually, we're hoping to bring one at the grade seven level as well.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thanks Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, back to inclusive schooling, can the Minister advise if it's based on the assessment of the student, I was wondering if they need to have parental consent before they assess the individual students?
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Minister.
In terms of a medical-type assessment then, yes, they do have to go through a formal form of consent. Some of the other ones is just teacher reporting in the classroom.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, so as I understand it, if parent consent is received, an individual comes and does an evaluation on that particular student. The deputy minister spoke earlier of more of a blanket assessment just talking to the teachers who work with the students to do an overall assessment to determine where the greatest needs of inclusive schooling occur. Does that mean that maybe next year or even sometime during this year some sort of shift in the funding of inclusive schooling dollars? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Minister.
With a lot of the work that we're doing within Education Renewal some of the work is pretty new so it's too early to really say right now. The way we're doing the funding framework for inclusive schooling is something new as well: the accountability framework on the side, making sure that the schools and the education authorities with the dollars that we give them are being utilized directly for special needs and the students that need that little extra help.
It’s too early to say right now but we are developing these monitoring and evaluation plans to ensure that we're providing adequate resources for inclusive schooling.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I'm just looking at again the inclusive schooling budget and I'm looking at things like the rates of graduation. Something indicates to me that if you have very low graduation rates that then there would be a higher need for inclusive schooling. I'm wondering if, in addition to the maybe sort of like an informal assessment that's being done by teachers, for I don't really know what purpose if it's not going to shift inclusive school dollars. We also have a long history of knowing what the graduation rates are between communities, whether they be large communities, Yellowknife, or small communities. I'm wondering if that information would be used to reallocate the inclusive school funding or, better than reallocate, increase the amount of funding that goes into inclusive schooling to make sure that there's sufficient support in place for communities where graduation rates are lowest? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Minister.
A lot of concerns are… Obviously graduation rates are a big concern and you can tie that in as well to attendance and looking at developing what we can do as government on the attendance issues in some of the communities.
With the inclusive schooling it also needs to reflect what some of the complex needs are in some of our communities in the Northwest Territories. I know that the schools also get funding on an enrolment basis so there's a lot of areas that the number brought up in terms of how we fund inclusive schooling, but we've also got to make sure that we have dollars and resources there for the everyday operations of our schools and organizations that provide programs to our schools.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I'm just trying to make sure that no students are left behind. One of the things that the Minister just mentioned does tweak my interest, and that's attendance. I actually think we have a solution to attendance and that's to give their parents jobs. Anyways, I'm always talking about jobs and employment and that, you know, one of the main reasons I do that is because I'm trying to increase the graduation rates and have the smaller communities, having educated people able to do jobs that may come to them in the future. Again, looking at just the information that we have now, would the Minister feel comfortable in saying that, at this point, the $27-some-odd-million dollars that's going into inclusive schooling is fairly allocated between the various education authorities? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Minister.
