One critical issue for voters to consider as the provincial election nears is education.
Surrey is B.C.’s largest school district. Yet it continues to struggle with many issues — lack of classroom space, inadequate funding from the province and, most notably, a strong influx of students that continues year after year.
The current education minister is Surrey-Green Timbers MLA Rachna Singh, who is seeking re-election in the new riding of Surrey City Centre. One would think that she would be fully aware of all these issues, given that her constituents are experiencing them firsthand. Yet she rarely addresses the unique challenges found in Surrey.
The board of education is very aware of the issues faced by students, teachers and parents, and brings them up at every opportunity. The very experienced trustees have made strong and reasonable cases for help from the province, but the response is mostly silence.
This provincial ignorance is nothing new. Surrey students have faced a lack of classroom space since growth first began in earnest in the 1940s. Each successive government — Coalition, Social Credit, NDP, Social Credit, NDP, BC Liberal and now NDP again — has been very slow to realize the depth of the problem. On dozens of occasions, the province has pleaded poverty.
This month, several thousand new students flocked to schools. Overall enrolment is about 85,000. Yet the province has refused to fund new portable classrooms. In a few high schools, the school day has been extended to make better use of the classroom space, but this only scratches the surface.
Just last week, trustees discovered that an 800-seat addition to Fleetwood Park Secondary won’t go to tender until 2026. This despite the architect saying it could proceed more quickly.
"It doesn't make any sense. I don't think it makes any sense to any of the board, to be quite honest with you. Here we are in a crisis as far as having students in classrooms and then we see that an agreed-to addition has a date that it goes to tender in 2026? This isn't expediting anything. This is, as far as I can see, actually rolls it back," said a frustrated trustee Terry Allen.
Trustee Laurae McNally was a relatively new trustee the last time a Surrey MLA (Bill Vander Zalm) was education minister, in 1983. She noted that large buildings in the days of the Roman Empire, notably the famed Colosseum in Rome, were planned and built faster than some new schools in Surrey.
Some students lost bus transportation this month because the board had to cut funds to shore up other areas of the budget. Portables are not the only item funded. Inflation, a pressing problem for everyone, is not funded.
There is no doubt that the high cost of land and limited availability of it creates some additional pressures in building new schools in Surrey. However, there are innovative ideas out there about putting some schools on several floors of larger commercial buildings located near parks and playing fields. Where is the leadership from Victoria on any of these issues?
Voters, as they consider which candidates to vote for, should give plenty of thought to the fundamental needs of students. If we as a society are truly concerned about the coming generations, adequate education facilities and funding are a must.
Frank Bucholtz writes twice a month on political issues for Black Press Media publications.
