It's a sad day' for students: trustee -- $6 million worth of cuts approved 5-2
Nelson Bennett, Richmond News
April 21, 2010

One Richmond school trustee was reduced to tears and two others pushed to acts of defiance Monday night, as the Richmond Board of Education approved nearly 100 job cuts as part of a $6-million budget reduction.

"I think today we are seeing student achievement decline in Richmond and it's a sad day," trustee Donna Sargent said just before breaking into tears.

Trustees voted 5-2 to approve $6 million worth of cuts to the 2010-2011 budget.

Parents and school staff came out to have their say at Monday's school board meeting held at Burnett secondary where trustees approved a $6 million budget cut. Students with learning needs will be hardest hit, with 33 learning resource and educational assistants axed from the payroll. However, as one parent noted, when support for special needs students is reduced, all students in the class suffer.

Then, in an act of defiance, they refused to vote on a recommendation to appoint an architect to oversee the installation 13 new portable classrooms -- at a cost of $4.6 million -- which are needed for the implementation of full-day kindergarten.

Trustees also passed a motion formally requesting B.C. Education Minister Margaret MacDiarmid retract statements she made in a letter to the editor in the Richmond News -- a letter trustees described as "disgusting" and filled with "half-truths" about education spending….

Conspicuously absent Monday were Richmond MLAs Rob Howard John Yap and Linda Reid, who were invited to attend.

"They're the people who hold the money -- they should be here too," said retired teacher Jim Rollins.

Rollins, who taught in Vancouver and lives in Richmond, said Richmond is known as a "lighthouse district" because of its inclusiveness policies. That is now under threat, he said, and challenged trustees to simply say no to the cuts.

"Don't back up one step from what you've achieved," he said, urging trustees to "break the law" and pass a deficit budget….

While the other five trustees approved the budget, not one could be found to move a motion to appoint an architect to be in charge of putting in 13 new portable classrooms (at $350,000 each).

The portables will be needed in order to implement all-day kindergarten, which school boards across B.C. are being forced to implement.

Trustees feel the cuts they have just passed were made in order to pay for a pet project of Premier Gordon Campbell.

"This, to me, is absolutely ridiculous," Sargent said. "We are laying off people this evening and we are starting a brand new program."

Applause erupted when the motion on the portable classrooms proposal failed to pass for the lack of a mover.

Several speakers Monday made it clear they blame the provincial government, not the school board, for the cuts they were forced to make….

Secondary school youth support workers warned that cutting their jobs will mean students at risk of falling through the cracks may do just that -- a worry echoed by Lynda Murdoch, a mother of a school-aged child and clinical psychologist who works for the Ministry of Children and Families.

She said she expects workers like her will be seeing those students who fall through the cracks.

"All we are doing is shifting the cost from the education system to the criminal justice system and the mental health system," she said.

Perhaps the most poignant plea to preserve Richmond's inclusiveness model came from a parent of a child who does not have special needs.

An emotional Ingrid Trouw said her son told her one day he was no longer able to take peanuts to school because one of his classmates was allergic to them. When she asked which child it was, her son could only describe her as having red hair.

When she went to the class she saw that the girl in question was severely disabled, could not talk and was confined to a wheelchair. Her son saw none of that.

"The way he described her was just because of her red hair," she said. "Nothing to do with the wheelchair or anything

"This is what inclusion means to us."…

THE CUTS INCLUDE:

• 18 learning resource teachers;
• 15 educational assistants;
• 11 early shift custodians;
• 10 "floaters" (on-call teachers and staff);
• 8.4 teacher-librarians;
• 5 elementary band program positions;
• 2.1 learning services staff;
• 1.4 ESL support….