Information about Bill 11 and School Board Governance
Bill 11 – Education Statutes Amendment Act, 2015
- Information about Bill 11 and Teacher Professional Development
- Information about Bill 11 and Student Privacy
- Information about Bill 11 and School Board Governance
What are the major concerns about Bill 11 regarding the governance of school boards?
The bill gives the Minister of Education broad new powers over elected school boards.
The minister has power to issue administrative directives to school boards, if she or he believes the board is failing to meet obligations, or “it is in the public interest to do so.”
Administrative directives can be on any matter, including any “matter specified by the Minister.” Other legislation can be overridden to achieve the objectives of directives.
The Minister can force school boards to find administrative savings through shared services agreements. Some boards could gain authority over others.
Failure of a board to comply with an administrative directive is grounds to replace the democratically elected trustees by appointing an “official trustee” to run the district.
Trustees at the recent BCSTA Annual General Meeting passed a motion demanding changes to those parts of Bill 11 that allow the Minister to override their powers.
How has the role of school boards changed in BC?
Over recent decades, BC’s school boards have faced reductions of their powers:
the loss of local taxation powers
the move from local to provincial bargaining
amalgamations of districts
BC Public School Employers’ Association (BCPSEA) made employer bargaining agent
chronic underfunding and downloading of costs onto school districts.
What related challenges are school boards facing?
Budgets are subject to government underfunding and imposed additional costs every year. For the next two years, boards will also be required to find $54 million in administrative savings.
For years it’s been suggested that government might create a regional board model for education. Bill 11’s power grab and emphasis on shared services increase that possibility.
The “co-governance model” agreement between government and trustees has not improved the relationship, as seen in recent surprise government announcements on cuts to adult education, the administrative cuts requirement, and Bill 11 itself.
Why do school boards still matter?
Trustee loss of control over most budget decisions, and the inability to speak with a united voice to defend public education has weakened the relevance of school boards. Ideally, trustees will focus on the areas where they can make a difference, and reinvigorate their role.
Trustees live in their communities, and are best equipped to determine how resources should be allocated locally to address the increasingly diverse needs of their students.
The ability of parents and other community members to have direct conversations with their elected trustees means that both concerns and opportunities get a fair hearing.
Trustees can make decisions that protect neighbourhood schools from closure and strengthen their role as community hubs. They can provide programs communities want, and safeguard students and parents from ongoing attempts to privatize education in BC.
Ultimately, Bill 11’s power transfer can only be reversed by trustee advocacy and action
Information about Bill 11 and Student Privacy
Currently, the School Act has strict controls over the disclosure of student personal information.
Teachers in BC are concerned that the proposed amendments in Bill 11 erode student privacy by removing restrictions on the use of student personal information.
Background
As students progress through the British Columbia school system, their information is kept and updated. Student files and permanent student records include personal information, student report cards, relevant medical or legal documents, and other information schools may need. After a student has withdrawn or graduated from the system, student file records are retained only according to school district policy.
MyEducation BC, the Ministry of Education’s new student information system, will collect much more information about students, their studies and their behaviour from Kindergarten to graduation in a centralized database.
Proposed Bill 11 changes
The existing section of the School Act entitled “Non-disclosure of student records” is deleted in Bill 11, replaced with a new section entitled “Student personal information” which authorizes providing personal information contained in a school record for specified uses. This authorization for research is extended to “all public bodies” with no apparent safeguards for how these bodies use this sensitive information.
Bill 11 opens up the use of student personal information for many uses beyond the education of the individual student.
It removes the protection of private student data. It will be possible to link a student’s data with information about other students, and to other government services data.
It removes the School Act section that says an employee who knowingly discloses “any information contained in a student record that identifies a student” is committing an offence.
It makes wrongful disclosure of student personal information no longer a serious offense.
Teachers, students, and parents will access MyEducation BC and its data with the government service card, which is also the common link for everyone in BC to driver’s licences, health, social services, and all other government services and databases.
The BC Centre for Data Innovation says that “permitting private sector users is an emerging trend” in the development of government databases.
Bill 11 authorizes changes for private student data:
From being about the education of an individual student into being part of “big data,” where information from multiple databases is combined and “data mined.” It moves student data away from its central function in the relationship between student, teacher, and parent.
Student data could be disclosed to allow student achievement to be measured. For example, student test results might be used to “evaluate the effectiveness” of boards, programs, or courses.
Other privacy concerns of Bill 11 include:
No apparent safeguards for how public bodies disclose this sensitive information. This is troubling given the current lack of security for information held by government.
Student data is not properly protected from cyber security threat. The Auditor General reported that most public web applications are vulnerable to illegal access or malicious activity.
Repealing the School Act section “Removal or destruction of individual identifiers” appears to allow public bodies to retain student personal information indefinitely. This is problematic both because of the right to be forgotten, and because it places more personal information at risk if a public body holding such information is hacked.
Bill 11 opens up the use of student personal information for many uses beyond the education of the individual student.
It removes the protection of private student data. It will be possible to link a student’s data with information about other students, and to other government services data.
It removes the School Act section that says an employee who knowingly discloses “any information contained in a student record that identifies a student” is committing an offence.
It makes wrongful disclosure of student personal information no longer a serious offense.
Teachers, students, and parents will access MyEducation BC and its data with the government service card, which is also the common link for everyone in BC to driver’s licences, health, social services, and all other government services and databases.
The BC Centre for Data Innovation says that “permitting private sector users is an emerging trend” in the development of government databases.
Bill 11 authorizes changes for private student data:
From being about the education of an individual student into being part of “big data,” where information from multiple databases is combined and “data mined.” It moves student data away from its central function in the relationship between student, teacher, and parent.
Information about Bill 11 and Teacher Professional Development
Teachers in BC are concerned that Bill 11 could limit professional development opportunities for teachers, and remove or restrict their autonomy over their professional development choices.
Background
Throughout the history of public education in BC, teachers have supported each other by creating and offering a wide variety of professional development (PD) opportunities. There currently exists a vibrant and responsive network of support for teacher-directed PD.
Members of the BC Teachers’ Federation believe that
Teachers have an ongoing responsibility to engage in professional development. This process of growth enables teachers, individually and collectively, to enhance their professional practice.
Professional development plans must be guided by teachers’ needs and those of their students.
The most appropriate and effective professional development for teachers is only possible if they have the professional autonomy to choose it.
Professional development must be adequately funded with the necessary supports to access it.
The personalized, inquiry-based learning for students emphasized by the Ministry of Education in the new curriculum should be the same as that for teachers’ professional learning.
Many teachers who provided PD activities in their district have had their positions reduced or cut completely. Inequities in the province include access to PD resources between rural and urban areas.
Current BCTF support for professional development in BC
The BCTF supports and delivers professional development for all BC teachers through:
more than 30 Professional Specialists Associations and their learning communities
PSA Chapter and Local Specialist Association activities throughout the province
programs developed by local PD chairs, encouraging reflective self-directed PD
the BCTF workshop program offering a wide range of PD all over the province.
Concerns about Bill 11
Bill 11 is a manufactured solution for a non-existent problem. A government-mandated approach to professional development that focuses on compliance and validation from external bodies does little to support teacher professional learning. Considerable unnecessary costs would be incurred developing the bureaucracy needed to administer this imposed top-down, “one-size-fits-all” model, a model both ineffective and uninformed by the actual needs of classrooms.
Teachers already take part in a minimum of 25 hours of professional development per year, so it is difficult to understand the need for more regulations. Many BC teachers have degrees and qualifications beyond certification requirements, often achieved through weekend and summer courses. Compulsory types or hours of professional development does not encourage meaningful professional learning.
The Ministry says there will be an extensive two year consultation process about Bill 11 and professional development. Teachers hope that these discussions will deal with the real needs of teachers and students, rather than imposing an expensive and ineffective process on an already stretched system.
