Not so fast with expanded kindergarten, education minister says
Janet Steffenhagen, Vancouver Sun
November 18, 2008

Education Minister Shirley Bond says she remains committed to early learning, but warned Tuesday that a proposal for expanded kindergarten might not happen as quickly as she had hoped.

In February, Bond announced that her ministry would investigate the cost and feasibility of offering all-day kindergarten to all five-year-olds by September 2009 and extending that to four- and three-year-olds by 2010 and 2012 respectively. Currently, all-day kindergarten is available only for aboriginal, ESL and special-needs children.

Now she says that timetable might be optimistic.

"This is a massive undertaking," she told reporters. "The scope of this change is very significant in terms of the staff required, the space required and the dollars."

New Democrat education critic Norm Macdonald said the government appears to be backing away from the plan. But Bond insisted no decision has been made and won't be until after an agency that is reviewing the proposal submits recommendations next month.

"Optimistically, of course I would love to see the program implemented as quickly as possible," she said. "[But] we're just doing our homework and recognizing that this is a pretty significant undertaking."

Although the total cost of the initiative would be hundreds of millions of dollars, Bond said the economic downturn is not driving the government's thinking.