Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, today. What are the steps the government is taking to ensure that there is no child left behind in the up and coming school year, during this pandemic response? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Nunakput. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's a big question. There are 10 different education bodies and 49 different schools in 33 different communities, so a lot of different steps have been taken. As the Member noted, school was closed in mid-March, and the decision to close it for the remainder of the school year was made, I believe, on about March 26th. The reason for that is because the authorities and myself felt that, if you waited every two weeks to see if we would reopen, we wouldn't be putting the effort into delivering distance learning, and so the decision was made to close the schools for the remainder of the school year and put our efforts into preparing ways to educate students when they're at home or when they're out on the land.
Depending on where you were in the territory, there have been different methods taken. There was an assessment done in every community on how well different types of education would work, how many students had access to the Internet, how many students had access to computers. If those were low numbers, then that school would primarily be using a paper-based distance education. There have been lots of those done. There were no layoffs in the schools. All of the support assistants remained working, all of the teachers remained working, they continued to provide food programs. Many, many things have happened, and I could stand up here all day and talk about it, but the point is that an amazing effort was put in to ensure there was a continuity of education.
Now, has that worked as well as having in-person classes? Absolutely not. There is no way it could. Parents don't have time to teach when they are working full-time from home. Students need to be in school, there are no two ways about it. While much has been done, I will say that it's no replacement for in-person classes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I really want to highlight again from my Member's statement that our local DEAs in the Beaufort-Delta did an awesome job, and still are doing an awesome job, on a paper base, giving weekly homework for the students. I'm just wondering: is there any possibility with the local DEAs to assist the students who are home and not conducive to learning in regard to computers and stuff like that?
I'm not sure if the Member is speaking about students who don't have access to computers. In those cases, students have relationships with their teachers and, right down to the level of teacher and student, there was outreach. Teacher have done their best to connect with every student and ensure that every student has the opportunity to learn. In a number of locations in the Deh Cho, and I believe up in the Beaufort-Delta, as well, there were initiatives to distribute computers, Chromebooks. There were other jurisdictions where they were lending out their equipment. In communities where students might not have Internet, the schools would extend their Wi-Fi out into the parking lot so people could come and use the Wi-Fi, so every effort has been made in that sense during this school year. As much as could be done has been done.
I'll mention that I was on a call this morning with 17 education ministers from around the world, and we were all facing similar issues. In the United Kingdom, in Singapore, in Germany, all of these places have the same issues, and so we have done as well, I would say, as most other jurisdictions. We're also competing for supplies, as well. While we wanted laptops and Chromebooks, so did everyone else. So there were a lot of pressures on us, on the education system, but everyone really gave it their all and have been working full-out since the closures.
Yes, good job on the teachers phoning every second or third day to the students in my household. What is our government offering for counselling for supports for students who require immediate help?
Just like all the teachers and support assistants are still working, so are all the counsellors. Every school counsellor in the territory is still working, and they have continued their relationships with students. So, students who they were meeting with on a regular basis, as soon as the schools closed, they reached out to those students and continued those relationships. ECE and the education authorities did our best to let all students know that those counsellors were still available to speak with any student, so it's just not the ones who already have relationships. They're still available, and they're still available to speak with counsellors.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. What's the TA's and the school's plan to start getting ready for the opening of the school year to prepare their classes and schools for opening in September? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As soon as the Chief Public Health Officer released Emerging Wisely as well as the backgrounder document related to schools in which she made the recommendation to reopen schools, the department and the education bodies and the NWT Teachers' Association have been meeting on a daily basis, working to plan for next school year. Now that we know the requirements, we can start the plan. What ECE has done is, they've created a framework so that we have some continuity across the territory, we have a common framework to go by. Schools are now creating plans to open schools and abide by the orders of the Chief Public Health Officer. We're looking at doing some bigger schools and some smaller schools, medium sized schools, just a range, and then submitting those to the Chief Public Health Officer, getting feedback, and then that will help us plan for the rest of the school. This work is well underway. There's a bit of a reprieve. Right when the schools closed, everyone was working full out. Things sort of calmed down a bit, and they're going full out again, and people are putting in a lot of time to make sure that students will be safe when they return to school in September. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes.
