All-day kindergarten costs $1.5 million
Comox Valley Echo
Oct 13 2009
By: Christiana Wiens

School Board trustees will meet Wednesday at a special meeting of the board to clear up uncertainties around all-day kindergarten….

The education ministry has also asked for more information or a plan from each school district be submitted by Nov. 1 - forcing the district to come to terms with exactly how full-day kindergarten would operate here.

"We have issues with paying for it and finding adequate space and whether it should be offered in every school or just some schools," said Barr.

Kindergarten classrooms also tend to need more equipment and larger classrooms than standard elementary space - posing questions about capital costs and staffing as SD71 would need double the number of kindergarten teachers it has today.

The total cost for the upgrades locally is $1.5 million….

It also wants to establish kindergartens in 'neighbourhoods with high levels of child vulnerabilities' first, in available school district spaces while not displacing existing programs or the separate aboriginal full-day kindergarten programs.

To do that, the district will need to look at space in vulnerable neighbourhoods….

"That doesn't mean half the classrooms here will get it," said Barr.

The district has a number of space issues in elementary schools it is trying to solve through reconfiguration. …That could mean that some areas of the city would have full-day kindergarten access, while others would still be half-time….