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Al0 - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, March 8, 2006

Glass sizes here below average.

By DUSTIN QUEZADA’

A GOVERNMENT - report

on class sizes. shows the”

Mountains — school below . the provincial and legislated average limits but the head of the local teachers’ union - says the: ‘Statistics don’ t tell the full story. - °

_ Veralynn Munson said while the local ‘school dis- ‘trict has.made manageable class sizes a priority in the

Coast‘.

,Jast few years, the. govern- -

ment’s elimination of firm .. Class size limits skews the Aumbers, >.”

“In 2001, [teachers] w were

—_ stripped of class composi-

- tion. and class size limits i in

favour:of district averages,”

‘Munson said. "What that means is: the

provincial government leg-

islated a change that didn’t require firm limits for grades

4 to 12, instead boards only

needed’ to: maintain a dis- trict-wide average of 30 for ‘those classes. Additionally,

_ the province increased caps.

‘for primary grades from 20

. to.22 and from 22 to 24 for

_Btades 1 to 3.”

Munson © said teachers : would like to ‘see an upper |

~ limit. returned * in ‘the next collective agreement. ae “There used to be a’ ‘limit

“of 30° (students. ina “class),.

-Munson said. “The average

© doesn’t tell the: story on the

~ ground. ”

The district averages here’ -are: 16.8 in’ kindergarten; 20.1:in grades 1 to 3, 24.1 in grades 4 to 7; and'24.2 in,

* grades 8 to 12. . “This

classes‘: -are of a reasonable

__ size and: ‘that many of them - are small,” said education: © “minister Shirley Bond when

‘the statistics were released.

“tn fact, almost’ 15,000. .classes — or. more than one -

out-of every five — have 20 _ or fewer students.”

Munson.’ said. smaller communities tend to balance

” the numbers, leaving bigger

‘ communities within districts

i with overcrowded classes.

' ~ While the local district is in compliance with district- . wide averages, 12. per cent

of the 205 classes offered -

in ‘Terrace and Thornhill’s ‘three secondary schools

have more than 30 students .

enrolled. An English 8 course at

Skeena. Junior «Secondary .

. tops the list at 37 students.

School trustee and board” chair Lorrie Gowen says the 7 numbers could be worse if it -

_weren’t for money the dis-

~» trict’received:from the gov-°

~ Couch

on fire

FIFTEEN FIREFIGHTERS ©

"responded to a.blaze at a - Kalum Gardens townhouse on Hanson St. in the early

‘morning hours of March 2 to

discover a couch on fire.

An electrical heater left .

_on overnight ignited the sofa

and the blaze was limited to that piece of furniture, en- abling fire crews to douse the sofa shortly after arriv- ing:

: Firefighters remained for - about an hour to ensure the flames were out. oo,

‘The townhouse sustained ‘smoke damage throughout

- and water damage.

The mother and her 10-

year-old son inside escaped .

~ unharmed.

—sdAt’s believed the boy wasn’t feeling well and the . '- space heater was there to_

provide heat for him.

During the night, he felt something on his feet and .woke up in time to get him- self and his mother out of

. the building. Emergency

social services assisted the

family with shelter and sup- - plied items they needed.

'- Terrace fire ‘chief Peter

Weeber said space heaters 7

with timers are the best ones to use, and people need to ensure that they are not left onovernight.

The situation could’ve turned out a lot worse, he said. The fire department did not have a damage estimate as of late last week.

report ‘confirms ‘that the vast majority of our’

ernment — money it saved

during the teachers’ October . .2005 strike. » “The reason the num-- _ bers are down is because we hired extra teachers for some -schools,” Gowen said.

The district’s share of the strike savings was $205,965

and it was split almost 50/50 — between elementary and’ ‘high schools.

“At the elementary lev-

el, class composition. was

deemed. the. most critical area and $107,500 was spent on additional special staff assistants for 34 district

classes ‘with, four or more”

"PHARMACIST _Pavan Bhatti -

identified special education students.

Secondary schools were the benefactors of $96,600

‘that went toward _ offering nine additional course offer- ings. o

Gowen disagrees with Munson’s position on fixed

class limits, saying a district

average is more manageable here.

« “The capped number for- mula] was very difficult with

*the - district and the catch-

ment areas,” said Gowen. With class size limits,

Gowen said the district had.’ to split classes or-bus kids to:

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' schools outside their catch- ment areas.

“We really need to have

flexibility,” Gowen added. But:Gowen and Munson

agree the bigger problem i in. . the district is class. -composi-

tion.

“We “seriously need to : talk

about composition,”

Gowen: said, “adding the government has to take the cap off special needs spend-

"ing. Expenses exceeding the

$4-million cap have to come

from the basic. grant the dis-

‘trict receives, said Gowen. The class ‘size report

“found that provincially, dis-

tricts were under the legis-

Jated limits on average but

15 districts were not in com-

-pliance. The statistics were veri- 7

fied by individual districts Oe cz

and weresbased on enrol-.

ment numbers on Sept. 30, 2005. .

The B.C. Teachers’ Fed-

eration continues to push for class size and composition limits in advance of a new

collective bargaining agree-

ment.

. The current government- . - imposed» -contract June 30, 2006.

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