We all hate the SIF: PFE

People for Education sent out an e-mail to its contacts Wednesday, proudly proclaiming a 'unanimous verdict' on the Ministry of Education's School Information Finder. The list (below) includes 21 education-sector stakeholders, all of whom have agreed the SIF is the devil reincarnated. A new letter has been sent to Premier Dalton McGuinty and Minister of Education Kathleen Wynne as a result, with two requests and a question:

1. The group requests that promised consultations on the site begin immediately and that they include all stakeholders and allow for broad discussion.

2. The group requests the site be removed while the consultation takes place.
3. The group wonders who is supporting the site? They note that the Premier and the Minister have said there is support for the site. Given the agreement among all the recognized education stakeholders, they are surprised by this and have requested the Premier and theMinister provide information as to the identity of the supporters.

I'm not alone in blogging about the SIF, the reaction to it and the now-infamous "school bag" function and even the alternate site setup to provide the comparative feature removed from the original SIF site soon after its launch.
The site should continue to stay active, and as to PFE's question-- gee, lemme think about that. The site couldn't handle the traffic when it was launched. A $5 FOI request on the site's web data would no doubt show just how popular it is.
Move on, PFE. School boards are all staring at precarious budget situations, where in many boards the cuts won't avoid the classroom. Pump out more of your reports that provide valued information and commentary on what's happening in K-12 schools in this province. Keep focused on that and not the SIF.

The list of stakeholders:

Association des conseils scolaires des écoles publiques de l'Ontario

Association des directions et directions adjointes des écoles franco-ontariennesAssociation des enseignantes et des enseignants franco-ontariens

Association franco-ontarienne des conseils scolaires catholiques

Catholic Principals’ Council of Ontario

Council of Ontario Directors of Education

Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario

Ontario Association of Deans of Education

Ontario Association of Parents in Catholic Education

Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association

Ontario Catholic Supervisory Officers’ Association

Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association

Ontario Federation of Home and School Associations

Ontario Principals’ Council

Ontario Public School Boards’ Association

Ontario Public Supervisory Officials’ Association

Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation

Ontario Student Trustees’ Association

Ontario Teachers’ Federation

People for Education

Parents partenaires en éducation

Bluewater budget difficulties

The Sun Times reports on the Bluewater District School Board's budget difficulties in today's paper, an interesting one given the board is in the midst of a process to 'fix' its culture of secrecy, etc.

Vice-chairwoman Jan Johnstone expressed similar frustration throughout the budget discussion, questioning Booth on almost every item and insisting to know what funding was provided for each category and suggesting "only that for which we receive will we spend."
"Stick to the amount we get for staff development -- $360,000 -- and don't even think of spending over $800,000," Johnstone said, adding she was pleased $450,000 had already been cut from the staff development budget.
"But we need to go further," she said, suggesting the board write a letter to the Ministry of Education toe demand more funding.
"If they mandate something they need to provide the dollars to fund it," Johnstone said, requesting repeatedly for Booth to provide trustees with a list of what funding the board receives and what each area of the budget actually costs.

These are challenges being faced by other boards in the province, as they try and rationalize millions in new funding to pay for salaries and benefits versus specific areas where the Ministry of Education has said they must cut.
Surprisingly, other than when the staff layoff / redundancies have been announced, there has been precious little coverage of the actual budget challenges facing virtually every board.

School obituaries

The Simcoe Reformer published this article Wednesday regarding the last few weeks of classes at Windham Central Public School, a Grade 7/8 school in Norfolk County. Reporter Dan Pearce did a great job of covering the bases, speaking to adults and kids affected by the pending closure.

"What's the point of going to a school one year and go back to your other school?" said Grade 7 student Rodney Boodram, 12, who will return to Delhi Public School in September.
Grade 8 student Bailey Henwood said most students are against the closure.
"A lot of us are not happy about it because we've been here and it's been amazing," said Henwood, 14, of Vanessa. "It's so great to come to school with your own group. We have lockers and don't have to do things with little kids.
"I think it's terrible."

As we approach the final few weeks of the school year, there will be several similar articles regarding the last weeks of classes at schools impacted by the first rounds of accommodation reviews across the province.
There are a few more examples (here, and here) from the neighbouring Thames Valley, where school closure ceremonies are being held in these weeks for the handful of schools that won't reopen in September (a few will, but will then close around Christmas).
These are important stories to tell, and it would be a shame if the majority of my colleagues out there simply overlooked these stories. In many cases, the facilities that are closing were either built at the start of the 20th century or when the last large round of consolidations from one- and two-room schoolhouses happened in the 1950s and 1960s.

School authorities to disappear

Tomorrow's Trust has this info the Ontario Ministry of Education has notified 20 school authorities they will be amalgamated into a neighbouring district school board effective September. The post includes a list of those school authorities to be amalgamated. Wow.
Many of these continued to exist as separate entities in recognition of either geography or a strong local history of not being a part of the other local school boards.
This news is interesting given Bill 177 says for these school authorities must name a director of education and treasurer, regardless of size.

SQE starts a blog

The Society for Quality Education has started a blog on its website. The notice was e-mailed out to those on its contact list Tuesday. Part of its first post:

One of our main strategies is to empower parents, grandparents, and teachers by arming them with proven teaching methods and materials.
As part of this effort, our blog will provide readers with solid information about good education - and lots of it - in a very readable and entertaining format.

Though a previous post outlined some, er, concerns with one of the SQE's reports, this country needs as many people writing about education as it can get. Consistent, high-quality coverage in the media (whether MSM, in the blogosphere or elsewhere) of policy and practice is sorely lacking, as are discussions on the different visions to improve what we have.
I welcome the blog and have included it in the featured links at the right.

LFP wakes up to accommodation / budget story

The London Free Press published a feature article Saturday (main article here, related stories here and here) contrasting school boards' pending budget difficulties and school closures against the millions they have been spending on school renewal and construction projects. Congrats to Kelly Pedro for getting this story out during a budget cycle and in the midst of all the construction work.
This is a situation that is not unique to the London region, and has been happening all over the place. The LFP is catching up to this story, which has been happening for well over three years now in their coverage area. As an aside, the paper has been through four education reporters in the past five years, perhaps part of the reason why the newsroom hasn't been keeping tabs on these various closures, consolidations and new construction.
The paper never covered any accommodation review committee meetings while they were ongoing, even missing a number of board meetings where these decisions were made. RogersTV and the local Fanshawe College station XFM, do a more consistent job of covering local boards. However, because they are the 'paper of record' for southwestern Ontario, they can get away with these lapses by publishing a feature like this every once in awhile and assuaging readers, politicians and the school board that they still care about education.
Unfortunately, that's not unique to the LFP either-- check your local medium- to large-market newspaper and see when the last time they consistently covered education was.

Novel idea from letter writer

The Sudbury paper featured this letter to the editor from Gord Lundgren regarding the future use of several schools pegged for closure.

The school board should be looking into the box instead of out of it. Citizens must take a stand. Schools that are closing should be turned into low-rentals.

This is an interesting letter, given many vacant, surplus school buildings have been redeveloped into housing. Not always accessible or affordable housing, but apartments or condos nonetheless. Lundgren is incorrect in his request the board handle this transition, since boards cannot redevelop and own residential property. It's up to developers in Sudbury to see the value of these buildings, purchase them from the boards and do the work.