Bill 1, the legislation introduced and passed by Rachel Notley’s NDP to reduce school fees in Alberta, could have an impact on more than just transportation and supply fees in the years to come.
In an e-mail to school boards in May 2017, education minister David Eggen explained that after the first phase of the bill is implemented work will continue on the matter of making changes to other school fees.
“The development of this subsequent version of the regulation will include a more thorough consultation with impacted stakeholders and will align with the government’s direction of reducing or eliminating certain fee types,” Eggen wrote.
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The impact of reducing or eliminating school fees reared its head as the Calgary Board of Education (CBE) discussed its 2017 budget on Tuesday.
“This isn’t the end of this,” said trustee Pamela King. “We know there’s version two of this.”
King went on to say that while the current reduction of fees came with funding from the province to cover the costs, there are no guarantees that will be the case with fees which are eliminated in the future.
“I feel nauseous about a lot of aspects of what is being done this year. How big of a hole are we going to be in for the next reduction of school fees?”
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CBE chief financial officer Brad Grundy said it was his understanding that there are conversations going on at both the administration and trustee level at school boards around the province on the impact further fee reductions may have, and the government’s willingness to cover the spread.
“I think you’re starting to hear many of the concerns that are out there around implications of Bill 1,” Grundy said. “From field trips to extra-curricular sports teams to international travel to the cost of enhancing courses in our system.”
“For me, the fundamental question is whether the government is going to take a funded approach to this, or a ‘suck-it-up’ approach to this. If it’s the ‘suck-it-up’ approach, I think we saw in this budget that we have still $30-odd million in fees that are contributing to the bottom line.
“If we’re advised at some point in time we can no longer charge those fees and need to absorb those costs somewhere in our system, that’s a big problem. If there are additional dollars coming along with it — in whole or in part — the problem gets a little bit smaller.”
Grundy said the CBE has made the strategic decision to stay engaged with Alberta Education in order to be part of the conversation surrounding the implementation of Bill 1.
“We are certainly sharing with Alberta Education our issues, concerns, and challenges as we become aware of them as we move through this Bill 1 journey,” said Grundy.
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“I do believe there is a desire to create a fee-free path through education in the province and that will have sweeping implications across the system.”
Grundy felt the conversations surrounding Bill 1 and its impacts envelop a broader conversation about what education will look like in Alberta in the future.
“What is core education in this province? What does it mean to have choice in our system? Those seem to be some of the big issues that are surfaced by Bill 1.”
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