All-day kindergarten starts at BICS this September
By Martha Perkins
Bowen Island Undercurrent
February 04, 2010

Full-day kindergarten is coming to Bowen Island this September.

Last Friday morning, the West Vancouver School Board announced that Bowen Island Community School is one of the schools in the province which will introduce the new five-day-a-week program in 2010.

"In this school board it's not a stretch for us because parents have had the option of kindergarten-plus," says Jennifer Anderson, the principal of BICS, who is excited about the new program.

Kindergarten-plus is a user-pay service that allows parents to keep their kindergarten-age child in school for the entire day. There's a morning K-plus program and an afternoon K-plus program, both of which have been very successful on Bowen, Anderson says.

But kindergarten-plus and full-day kindergarten are not quite the same….

Kindergarten is not mandatory. Parents can choose to keep their children at home until Grade 1, even though most parents choose kindergarten.

However, there's one important difference between all-day kindergarten and K-plus.

Unlike K-plus, which is an option, parents who sign their child up for all-day kindergarten should not be taking their child out of school for half the day.

"Parents must either opt in or out," says Ciarniello. "They either choose to attend full day or not at all. We are not funded for half-day students in schools that are designated full day."…

Fiona Beaty is the outgoing executive director of the Bowen Children's Centre. "This is something we've anticipated for quite some time," she says. While full-day kindergarten at BICS might affect their numbers, she's not worried about it.

"This is a wonderful centre," she says. "It's a tradition on this island. We have flexible service options because that's what Bowen families want. We're open year-round and have an after-school club. We adapt to what families need."…