Derek Neary
Northern News Services

Fort Simpson (Mar 22/02) - The Fort Simpson District Education Authority (DEA) is dipping into its operations and maintenance budget to hire two additional staff at Bompas elementary school.

Another classroom assistant and half-time teacher are being employed until the end of the school year, according to Shane Thompson, chair of the Fort Simpson DEA. The move is necessary because the student-teacher ratio at Bompas is too high and the GNWT's inclusive schooling policy is posing problems with limited staff, he said.

As a result, the DEA decided to reallocate a portion of its budget.

"Again, we're going to have to take things from other areas so our kids can get an education, and we don't think that's fair," Thompson said, noting that the school's French program had been eliminated this year as a cost-cutting measure.

Thompson holds the education minister directly responsible, but it's the regional education council that will likely make future concessions.

Nolan Swartzentruber, director of the Deh Cho Divisional Board of Education, said the Dehcho Education Council has taken Fort Simpson's needs into consideration for next year's budget, which it is currently drafting. The council may again dip into its accumulated $1.2-million surplus to address needs in Fort Simpson as well as those in Fort Providence and Fort Liard.

"Once that surplus is gone, it's gone," Swartzentruber warned.

Without further funding assistance, Thompson said difficult decisions will have to be made again in September. "We may have to again look at where our money is and say, 'Well, we're not getting new books this year (because) we need a new teacher,'" he said.

An ongoing battle

The DEA and the Department of Education have exchanged volumes of correspondence over the past four years regarding many of the same complaints.

Following a visit by Education Minister Jake Ootes in November, the DEA sent yet another letter restating its concerns. The letter of response, which arrived last month, has done little to assuage the DEA, Thompson said.

In the five-page letter from Ootes, references to a report on inclusive schooling -- a practice in which all students are educated with their age peers regardless of ability -- highlight positive feedback from educators in the NWT. Thompson said the experience at Bompas elementary has been anything but positive under the current circumstances.

"We believe in inclusive schooling, but we're finding it challenging because the government doesn't put the resources to it," Thompson argued.

"When a teacher spends 90 per cent of her time looking after 10 per cent of her class, that's not fair to the other (students) ... and we're burning out teachers."

Thompson said Ootes has failed to recognize that Bompas exceeds the 16:1 student-teacher ratio that the government is targeting across the NWT. At the meeting in November, the ratio was said to have been 19.3:1.

Nobody from the Department of Education was available for comment prior to press deadline. However, during his November visit, Ootes said the department is concentrating on the overall picture and can't make special allowances for Fort Simpson.