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By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

Wolf Creek Public Schools cutting staff to balance next year’s budget

Apr 17, 2018 | 2:45 PM

Wolf Creek Public Schools finds itself in a less than ideal fiscal situation.

The board of trustees recently approved the budget for 2018/19 and it comes with over $2.6 million in cuts in order to maintain a balanced book.

The cuts, unfortunately, mean job losses.

In all, the number of school social worker positions in Wolf Creek will drop from 19.67 full-time spots to 10.0, and Inclusive Education Coaches will decrease from 15.7 full-time positions to 9.0.

There are also cuts to staff at the division’s central office.

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“The trend we’re seeing is we have growth in some sectors, but in Blackfalds last year a brand new Catholic school opened and there were some students and parents who made the shift over to that school,” says Superintendent Jayson Lovell. “That actually resulted in 133 students moving over that we had previously.”

Wolf Creek was ultimately off by 220 students when it projected enrolment for the 2017/18 school year, which meant this latest budget would have to be a course correction, in Lovell’s words.

“To some degree, it’s demographics that play a big part in it, and understanding the fiscal realities in our school division around the cost of education,” he says. “K-12 education is costly. Costs are rising and a lot of them are fixed costs.”

Not only does the division receive less money with declining enrolment with the per student model, but the way the province doles out money for inclusive learning is fixed, meaning Wolf Creek hasn’t received any more funding for that area despite a 50 per cent increase in students utilizing that type of resource.

There are approximately 7200 students in Wolf Creek Public Schools, 12 per cent of which Lovell says are “inclusive learners.” He says that could mean they are physically disabled or suffer from mental illness or anxiety.

To boot, the carbon tax will cost the division $53,000 over the coming fiscal year.

Asked what he would say to parents who may be concerned that their won’t be as many support staff for their kids, Lovell says, “We have to be extremely efficient and effective and that would be the commitment I’d offer as a superintendent. We are 100 per cent committed to doing everything we can with the resources we have and ensuring we are not impacting the classroom experience.”

Lovell says that means getting creative and innovative.

“We have already had this conversation with Alberta Education, and we would very much like to see further analysis and consideration for school divisions who are seeing increases in students who have very diverse needs.”