Good news if you’re a parent or student in Surrey: the Education Minister’s hinting at more new school construction.
Rob Fleming said it’s unacceptable that Surrey has over 300 portables; one in ten students is in one.
“We made an announcement to create spaces to get rid of a third of them. We are only in the first year as government, we’ve got… three more years to take a run at fixing this problem in Surrey,” he said.
But he urges that relief is coming.
“The plan going forward is to give Surrey what it has deserved for years, which is to have schools in growing, thriving vibrant parts of that community. So we expect another busy funding year,” he said.
“If the previous government had announced 2,500 seats, like we did last year, for the past four years, we would have no portables in Surrey.”
Surrey has the largest and fastest-growing school district with 71,000 students.
Meanwhile, Fleming said there will be a new focus on student mental well-being this year. To that end, 140 additional teacher psychologists have been hired.
“When you have additional expertise and more employees in a school setting, you are able to have a bigger education team that is able to wrap around services better to the kid who may need it.”
The anti-bullying program will also be expanded to make it stronger.
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