Local historian Jack Peach (1913-1993) wrote this column about early schools in Calgary for the Herald in 1981.
Airdrie RCMP and the Airdrie Fire Department are investigating an arson at Ecole Edwards Elementary School.
On Tuesday around 12:40 a.m., Airdrie fire and RCMP members were called to the school after “unknown persons” had ignited the rubber surface beneath the school’s playground equipment, Mounties said in a written statement.
While police and firefighters are no longer on scene, the playground has been closed.
Anyone with information is asked to contact Airdrie RCMP by calling 403-945-7267. Tips can also be submitted anonymously through Crime Stoppers .
]]>With the rising cost of living making it more challenging for Calgary families to afford groceries, school nutrition programs are bracing for an increase in demand as students return to school.
However, the organizations behind school nutrition programs are also facing a spike in operating costs, stretching their resources thin.
The Breakfast Club of Canada supports more than 28,500 children across Alberta with food each morning through 280 school and community programs. Across the country, the club reaches more than 580,000 children but is currently looking at a possible $2-million shortfall this school year to keep up with its current programming.
“We’re seeing a lot more strain these days with our programs because of rising food costs,” said Amanda Boadi, an adviser for the Breakfast Club. “This year, we think it’s especially important to engage our corporate partners, Costco and Walmart specifically in Alberta, so we can help make sure we can sustain our high-quality programs despite increased food costs and attendance from students.”
The waiting list for schools has grown to more than 200 and counting.
Through a back-to-school fundraising campaign, the Breakfast Club of Canada is looking to raise $300,000 by Oct. 30. Donations can be made online at breakfastclubcanada.org .
Brown Bagging for Calgary Kids is also experiencing the pressure of inflated grocery prices as its school programs pick up.
“When we looked at our costs, comparing them from June 2021 to June 2022, we saw increases in nearly every category,” said Bethany Ross, BB4CK’s executive director. “The one that still catches me off guard when I look at it, is the price of celery increased 114 per cent over those 12 months.”
To combat the rising prices, Ross said they’ve been working closely with their community partners to lower the cost of groceries as much as possible but the bill is still higher.
“At this point, it hasn’t impacted our ability to provide food. We haven’t been providing less food or limiting the number of lunches we’re able to provide but those costs are real,” she said.
Over the course of the 2021-22 school year, BB4CK increased the number of kids supported by about 18 per cent and expects there to be more demand this school year.
“Those costs for families have increased,” she said. “We were already looking at about one in six kids who are living in households in Calgary experiencing food insecurity. We know families are making tough choices.”
BB4CK is holding a back-to-school fundraiser as well, which launches on Sept. 1. Every dollar donated in the month will be matched by the organization’s matching donors.
The Calgary Board of Education said in a statement it knows the importance that a nutritious breakfast and lunch have on students.
“Principals understand the needs of students within their schools and they work with system staff to identify the best nutrition program to support those needs based on available funding,” the statement said.
This school year, the board anticipates getting support for 150 schools from BB4CK, 25 schools from the Breakfast Club, 37 from the School Nutrition Program and 12 from Calgary Meals on Wheels. Schools also have emergency pantries with pre-packaged food in case of forgotten lunches.
“The number of schools involved with nutrition programs continues to change depending on external influences,” said the school board.
Food programs at Calgary Catholic School District schools are primarily funded by the Breakfast Club and President’s Choice Children’s Charity. Between the two programs, 3,300 students were supported last school year and the board anticipates about 3,500 receiving food security support this year.
Seven schools also receive help from the provincial government’s School Nutrition Program and two schools get support from the Calgary Food Bank’s weekends program. The Integrated School Support Program and BB4CK also help out.
I Can For Kids pivoted its summer lunches program during the pandemic into a grocery gift card program to support families in need. The gift cards empower parents to send lunches with their children, said Donald Barker with the local organization.
Barker added food insecurity is now experienced by as many as one in five children in Alberta. Children being hungry at school has been linked to a lack of focus, higher rates of hyperactivity and lower performance on standardized tests.
“There will likely be more and more children who are struggling with accessing healthy food on a regular basis. I can almost guarantee that’s what all schools are going to notice,” he said.
Ross with BB4CK said people who might not be able to afford to donate because of their own tightening budgets can instead volunteer with school nutrition organizations to help with the task of feeding Calgary’s kids.
sbabych@postmedia.com
Twitter: @BabychStephanie
As the start of school fast approaches, the anxiety levels of parents — who normally look forward to their kids getting back into a school routine — are spiking.
Not surprisingly, those commercials from Staples declaring back to school as “the most wonderful time of the year” for parents have not been playing at all, let alone constantly as in years past.
Just how worried, however, should parents be about COVID-19 affecting their child or children’s health?
In short — not very. Let’s let the numbers do the talking to start.
According to the federal government’s COVID-19 Epidemiology Summary as of Aug. 16, Canada has had 122,087 confirmed cases of COVID-19 — with 9,026 deaths for a death rate of 7.4 per cent.
Only 9,909 children under the age of 19 have tested positive for COVID in Canada and one child has passed away. The death of any child is a terrible tragedy. However, the only thing we know about this particular child is that she was female. We don’t know her age, whether she had underlying medical conditions. Nothing.
On the government website, the death rate for Canadians 19 and under is listed as zero per cent or 0.010 per cent, according to my calculations.
Dr. Stephen Freedman, a professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at the University of Calgary, says when you consider that the COVID infection rate is likely eight to 10 fold greater than that confirmed by testing, it’s more like the death rate in Canada for kids under 19 is one in 100,000 or 0.001 per cent.
“We know, in general, that children often — even when they are infected with COVID — do not develop symptoms,” said Freedman. “And those who do develop symptoms tend to be extremely mild.
“I’m looking at this from a global level, so when you ask the question, ‘How safe is COVID-19 for kids?’ In the grand scheme of things, it’s very safe. Children rarely have complications when they’re infected with COVID.
“The big concern for parents should be their own health as well as the health of other at-risk individuals or high-risk individuals. So grandparents, for example, immunocompromised individuals whether they’re in the house or they come in contact with the children.
“At a public health level, we worry a lot about spread in the community. So if all of a sudden lots of children get sick and they have mild symptoms, who are they going to give it to? That becomes a big question.”
When you consider that most parents with school-aged kids tend to be on the younger side, there’s not much risk there either.
According to the federal government’s figures, only nine people between the ages of 20 and 29 have died from COVID-19 in Canada, with a total of 84 spending time in the intensive care unit. For those between the ages of 30 and 39, there have been 11 deaths and 115 who spent time in the ICU. For those aged 40 to 49, there have been 50 deaths. Again, all of these deaths are tragic, but when you factor in that the infection rate is likely much higher than those who have been confirmed, the risk for young parents of young children is virtually nil.
Freedman wants to make it clear that this “doesn’t mean we should encourage children to get sick because your child still might be sick with a runny nose, a cough and a fever and no parent wants that for their child.”
Fair enough. But the lesson in panic that seems to be overtaking the back-to-school story all over the world really needs to be put into perspective.
“One of the big worries to a lot of parents is, what if your child can’t go to school for two weeks because they’ve gotten infected?” asks Freedman. “How are you going to manage that if you are a single parent working outside of the home or both parents work outside of the home. Who’s going to be at home?”
It’s not likely to be grandma or grandpa, since the older you get the more deadly this disease gets.
“We worry about the child getting infected, but not because of their own health,” reiterates Freedman. “The child is most likely to experience a mild, short-lived illness or even be asymptomatic, but it’s really who they’re going to give it to.”
As we know, however, other factors have to be weighed off against the purely physical risk of COVID-19. Is there a risk to a child’s mental health, social development and long-term educational outcomes by staying at home?
Experts say yes.
“The social isolation is very challenging for the family — for the children, for the parents and everyone’s mental health and well-being — there’s no doubt about it,” says Freedman.
“How to quantify that is very, very difficult. And then how do you balance that with their education, with their socialization, with the risk of being exposed to COVID? There’s no single metric or measure that can do that.
“We’re definitely seeing a large number of children presenting with mental health concerns,” says Freedman, who works out of Alberta Children’s Hospital in Calgary. “We don’t have data yet that I have seen to say it’s higher than it has been in previous years, but our suspicion in some of our anecdotal reports of that is it’s higher than previously. It’s reasonable to say that I think clinicians are seeing an increase in the number of cases.”
The mental health and educational outcomes of kids has to be weighed along with the risk of catching COVID.
As an older mom of twin sons who are now 23 — one of whom has asthma — I have wondered how I might have responded to the return to school had I faced this. My husband and I have discussed it and we would have sent them back into the classroom because missing out on their education would be a bigger risk to their lifelong well-being than catching COVID. Nothing worth doing in life is without risk. It’s a matter of weighing and balancing those risks. The simple arithmetic indicates that most Canadian kids should return to school come September.
Licia Corbella is a Postmedia columnist in Calgary. lcorbella@postmedia.com
]]>Haider Nakukara misses going to school.
The nine-year-old misses seeing his friends and learning from his teachers in a classroom.
The COVID-19 pandemic has meant his learning has to happen at home — not as much fun as going to school every day.
Fortunately for Nakukara, he’s got Sara Herlevsen in his corner.
Soon after the novel coronavirus started spreading and most people were sent home in Alberta, the 31-year-old massage therapist decided to send out a message on Facebook to let people know she’d be volunteering to tutor any kids who needed help.
Nakukara’s parents responded, and now he’s working with Herlevsen on just about every subject he’d normally be studying in school.
It has been, in his own words, awesome.
“She’s amazing,” Nakukara said. “She’s helping me to stay (educated) while I’m at home.
“She’s so nice, she’s funny and she always has a positive attitude about what I say and ask her to do.”
Ever since she put out that pivotal Facebook post offering her tutoring services for free, Herlevsen has been busy. Really busy.
Parents contacted her from as far away as the United Kingdom and Australia. She’s helping more than 150 kids and starts video-chatting with the young students at 6 a.m. on most mornings. Her schedule usually doesn’t slow down until mid-afternoon.
Related
It needs to be emphasized that it’s all free. Herlevsen is just trying to help in whatever way she can in the midst of a global pandemic that is disrupting so many lives.
Herlevsen has ADHD, and wanted to offer her services to parents of kids who also had ADHD to see if she could help make learning from home a little easier.
“I’m finding that with being stuck home and particularly with ADHD, those kids (sometimes) only want to do what they want to do,” Herlevsen said. “There’s a lot of pressure and tension in the world and they’re not really in the zone for the curriculum, exactly. So I take parts of the curriculum and try to apply it case-by-case.
“One of the kids was struggling with book reports, and during the pandemic they couldn’t get her to sit down and read, let alone write a report. So we started with movies and she would do a movie report. She really liked the Mary-Kate and Ashley (Olsen) movies, so we found her the Mary-Kate and Ashley books online, and she wants to read those. We just had to find her something she was excited to read.”
Herlevsen has offered to tutor any subject, although she admits she’s more comfortable with some than others. She’s been an avid reader her whole life and has a keen interest in politics, so those are easier, but there are topics in other countries’ curriculum that she’s less familiar with.
“The American Civil War, that one threw me, I won’t lie. That is all over the American curriculum at every grade,” Herlevsen said. “I was also a little bit scared when the math came up, especially long division, so I spent time on YouTube making sure I remembered it and I had it down and then if I do make a mistake I explain, that’s why you show your work, so you can go back and find where you made the mistake.”
Nakukara listed space, science, social studies, art and language arts when asked what he was working on with Herlevsen.
A diorama of the solar system has been his favourite. It’s not quite finished yet — he’s got to work on Jupiter. With Herlevsen’s help, though, he’s eager to complete the project.
]]>Rendering the greatest possible service to the people of Alberta was the mandate when in 1916 the Alberta government created what would become the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology, the first such institute in Canada and the first publicly funded polytechnic in North America.
The Provincial Institute of Technology and Art that opened its doors on Oct. 16, 1916, was many things to many people.
To five youngsters needing a career, it was a place to learn metalworking.
Six veterans of the Great War rounded out the 11-person full-time roster, all enrolled in an eight-month motor mechanics program.
Hundreds of other students filled evening, weekend and correspondence classes to capacity. They studied electricity, mathematics, drafting, nursing, accounting, bookkeeping, teaching and coal mining.
The school’s first principal, James C. Miller, promised that within three years the Calgary institute would “astonish Western Canada.”
In 2016, SAIT astonishes the world.
Providing relevant technical training has been the hallmark for a century.
Retraining veterans was its main task from 1916 to 1920. Then the Provincial Institute of Technology and Art — or PITA — focused on training civilians.
Booms and busts set the pace for PITA’s evolution.
An economic depression after the First World War ended with a boom at the Turner Valley oilfield southwest of Calgary in 1924. The Tech — PITA’s nickname — trained geologists and technicians in support of the development of Western Canada’s first major oilfield.
Hard times in the 1930s prompted PITA to provide free courses to the unemployed — staff instructors taught for free, too.
The Second World War shifted PITA’s emphasis again, and its location. From 1940 to 1945 many programs operated out of the old grandstand building at the Calgary Stampede. Artists moved into the Coste House in the Mount Royal neighbourhood of southwest Calgary.
The postwar boom contributed to PITA’s largest expansion. Its enrolments grew from fewer than 2,000 students at the end of the war to more than 50,000 total enrolments by the early 1980s.
In 1960, PITA was renamed the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology and the art department, although still part of SAIT, became the Alberta College of Art.
SAIT’s little brother, the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, began offering classes in Edmonton in 1962.
“We really thought the development of NAIT would reduce SAIT’s enrolment quite a bit,” SAIT president Fred Jorgenson recalled. “There was a lull for about two years at the most and then both institutions took off.”
SAIT finally gained its autonomy from the Alberta Department of Education in 1982, on April Fool’s Day, as the international price of oil went into free fall.
The board of governors, in charge of SAIT’s direction, turned to business leaders for guidance. Business principles and more than a few failed initiatives finally set the school on a firm financial footing.
More recently, the school on the North Hill has reinvented itself physically. A thriving village of learners inhabits spaces that delight. Buildings include a variety of materials instead of just concrete.
“This is wood … if you look at all this new stuff, it’s friendly, it’s human, it’s delightful,” says visionary architect Marty Cohos. “It allows the sun in, it creates space. It’s curved just for fun. For the joy of it.”
It took $1 billion to remake SAIT — much of it from private sources and passionate supporters that included successful alumni. The provincial government sat up and took notice of SAIT’s entrepreneurial initiative to bring money to the table to pay for new facilities.
As the pre-eminent place for relevant technical training in Canada, SAIT also influences the world. Students come from around the globe to study at the Calgary campus and SAIT delivers programs internationally, too.
In 1916, the Alberta government’s mandate for the institute was direct: “It must be related to the existing educational system but also to the industrial situation. The duties of the principal and staff are to include careful study of the industrial situation and educational needs of the industrial and commercial fields in order to render the greatest possible service.”
SAIT’s leader, president and CEO David Ross, affirms that goal.
“Here we are 100 years later and the premise of that has not changed,” he said. “In fact, I think it’s grown in strength. I think our differentiator and our key competitive advantage versus other post-secondaries is absolutely anchored in that comment.”
Rendering the greatest possible service to society is SAIT’s hallmark — past, present and future.
— Freelance historian David Finch wrote the history of SAIT — Shapers, Makers and Originals: The Story of SAIT’s First 100 Years
SAIT firsts:
1916: First publicly funded technical institute in North America;
1919: First to offer coal mining instruction via evening courses;
1921: First to offer summer school for teachers of vocational training.
First power engineering day course at a technical institute;
1939: First aeronautics course offered at a technical institute in Canada;
1945: First aeronautical engineering and aeronautical maintenance courses in Canada;
1949: First restaurant management course in Canada;
1958: First petroleum technology program of study in Canada.
SAIT led the way with many other educational initiatives, including delivering instruction remotely and online.
Architecture sidebar
Monstrous, imposing and hulking, a parkade towered over 16th Avenue in northwest Calgary for decades. SAIT greeted society with an ugly, concrete, inhuman face. Sinister lights glared out at night.
SAIT’s first physical iteration was brick and sandstone. Heritage Hall opened in 1922 on Calgary’s windswept North Hill and by the 1980s, the aging structure was an eyesore.
“They painted over windows and air-conditioning units were hanging from its walls,” architect Marty Cohos recalls. “People hated it. If your office was there, you were in Siberia.”
Lack of funds in the 1980s prevented the board of governors from demolishing the historically designated structure, preserved by the provincial and federal governments.
As the architectural heart of the campus, it anchors the institute that faces its community in the downtown core. Training skilled employees for those corporations has always been a priority.
Newer structures feature glass and metal, sweeping wood arches and futuristic architecture — and yet they all nod to the grand old lady, Heritage Hall, with colours or brick touches that link them to the oldest building on campus.
Reflecting glass, a wavy roof, bright banners and views into a busy village of learners now greets passersby on 16th Avenue N.W., the Trans-Canada Highway.
Canada’s first technical institute today shows an exciting face to the world.
SAIT centennial event open to the public
DATE: Oct. 16 — free public party
TIME: Noon to 7:30 p.m.
EVENTS: Barbecue lunch for 2,500; car, truck and helicopter show; family activities; performance by Juno award-winner Dan Mangan; time capsule reveal; giant cake; fireworks.
PLACE: SAIT main campus — 1301 16th Ave. N.W.
RSVP: Reserve your free spot at sait.ca/100
Quotable SAIT Centennial Sidebar
School principal William Aberhart did not think much of the proposed school in 1914, saying “the technical institute would not appeal to many besides the alien born and retarded.” In 1936, as premier and minister of education, he said that graduates of the institute looked “decidedly brighter for employment — notably those in technical areas. The Depression has left us with a shortage of skilled workers.”
“Teaching at Tech is the most agreeable work I ever tackled. Students are a good gang.” James Fowler, an original instructor in 1916 who became principal.
A 1926 Calgary Albertan editorial called the Provincial Institute of Technology and Art “a university of the people.”
“Alberta’s Unique Gift to Education” the Calgary Herald boasted of the Institute of Technology and Art in 1929. “New Canadians rub shoulders with Native Sons and Daughters in Cosmopolitan Groups.”
Instructor Marion Nicoll recalled that it was hard to keep students from eating the food on still-life displays in the 1930s. “We couldn’t even keep onions for a still life — they’d get eaten.”
“Scratch a ‘new-generation’ oilman — or woman — in any oilpatch around the world and the chances are good that you’ve scratched a SAIT petroleum graduate!”
Stan Perrott talked to a young woman studying art in the 1960s. “I have a feeling you should do one thing to perfection. Either you’re going to be an artist … or you’re going to be a musician, and I think you’ll do well there, too.” She chose music, changed her name to Joni Mitchell, and proved Perrott right.
“SAIT’s duty was to educate people so that they could perform very well in the workaday world,” said George Kermack, first chair of SAIT’s board of governors.
Irene Lewis, SAIT’s only female president and CEO, was honoured in 2010 by the University of Calgary and bestowed an honorary doctor of laws for her “passion and vision for the educational needs of individual learners in order to fully partake of their futures, and the needs of society to fully maximize the potential of its human capital.”
]]>It was a harried time in many households Tuesday morning. Many eager youngsters were excited about their first day back at school and equally excited parents were eager to see them off after a long summer of organizing activities.
The Tuesday after the Labour Day weekend means a change in all households, though, not just the ones with children. As kids trek off to school, packs on their backs and a lot on their minds, all drivers need to be aware that road and sidewalk traffic has increased. That’s especially true this year with six new schools opening across the city to accommodate the 170,000-plus students in both public and separate school systems. That means children criss-crossing roads in places such as Auburn Bay, Panorama and Copperfield where they weren’t before.
Being aware means paying attention to your speed, but also just plain paying attention.
It used to be a rite of fall that this newspaper and other media in early September urged drivers to slow down and not race through school and playground zones. But added to that message is the need to be focused on driving.
Kids, being kids, will be distracted at this time of year. They’re meeting up with friends they haven’t seen all summer and are less focused on you and your car than they are on their iPod or each other. But statistics show motorists are also guilty of being inattentive. The Calgary Police Service handed out 3,774 tickets for distracted driving between January and the end of July. Along with the $287 fines are three demerit points.
Police say speeding in school and playground zones is still their No. 1 concern at this time of year, but distracted driving is right up there. Officers have been out in force since some schools went back last Thursday, and they will keep up their neighbourhood patrols for a while yet.
They are serious about cracking down on offenders — and on Tuesday that included, ironically, a school bus driver.
A bus driver carrying kindergarten students was caught speeding in a school zone, going 52 km/h in a 30 km/h playground zone. That netted a $185 fine, according to Staff Sgt. Paul Stacey.
One hopes that in addition to the ticket, the busing company will be asking some pointed questions of their own. If we’re adamant about keeping our kids safe, it should start with the people we entrust to carry them to school each day.
As we launch into a new school year, consider it your homework: slow down and keep your eyes on the road, and hands on the wheel.
]]>Does anyone know the Phineas and Ferb song: “There’s 104 days of summer vacation and school comes along just to end it…but the annual problem of our generation is finding a good way to spend it?”
I’d like to know how Phineas and Ferb get 104 days. My school let out a week earlier than most and we still only get 75. I want to live where they live. But in any case, it’s summertime for kids everywhere! In Calgary the weather hasn’t been great, but this is the time we all look forward to: sleeping in, camping, vacations, spending whole days in our backyard or on our trampoline and basically not thinking about school for at least 75 days. Unfortunately, it shouldn’t be ALL fun and games. Here’s what you don’t want to hear – you have to keep your mind sharp over the summer. You have to do a little work if you want to not start the next grade in September behind where you ended in June.
Trust me, I know – the last thing any of us want to be doing is school work. My mom, whose mom and grandmother were English teachers, always tells me stories about how she had to read, do spelling bees and math quizzes in the summer. And my mom was pretty smart – she got a full scholarship to university. I would love a full scholarship to university, so I will sacrifice an hour a day to keep my mind sharp. Here are some good ways to not ‘dumb yourself down’ over summer vacation.
1. Practise and review daily (or at least 3 times a week). Each day, my little brother and I have to do thirty minutes of reading and thirty minutes of math. If you don’t have any good books at home, download one online from Amazon.ca for your Kindle (which has an app for i-devices) or download Wattpad on the app store. Wattpad is a great app for reading free and interesting books. Or you can do it the old fashioned way – go to the public library! It’s actually a fun afternoon to go to the library and read a book or two in those comfy chairs they have. Get a library card and borrow something that tweaks your interest. Check out the Calgary Public Library’s website. They have a lot of great recommendations and programs that will make reading enjoyable and not feel like a lot of work. Practising math is easier using websites like Mathletics or Prodigy. They make learning and reviewing math into games that turn into mini competitions. My school is participating in a math challenge and our scores help rank our school against others. It’s almost like a video game – I love seeing my name up on the leaderboard.
2. Eat healthy. Staying smart over summer break doesn’t just mean practice and review of subjects at school. The experts out there also recommend that we eat healthy. My parents stock a lot of fun snacks for us, but they also leave us fruits and veggies. I’d love to just snack on rice krispie squares all day, but if I do that, I feel awful by the afternoon and that doesn’t put me in a great mood to read a book or a math game. I kinda just want to take a nap. And it also doesn’t give me enough energy to ride my bike. Eating well gives you the right energy to have the most fun in the summer.
3. Exercise. There’s a reason why we have gym class in school – exercise is important. I’m not saying you should lift weights or spend hours at the gym, but it’s good to get your heart rate up ever once and a while. Maybe go for a bike ride to the park, a short walk in the neighbourhood, or even jump on a trampoline for bit. Try to do something active every day instead of spending your summer in front of a TV or computer screen. And if you followed suggestion No. 2 above, you’ll have lots of energy. And then you can do really well at No. 1.
Do you ever think to yourself that the summer seems to go by so quickly? Remember when you were younger and summer seemed to last forever? It seems much shorter now. My dad says it’s because we are getting older and growing up – gasp! But the truth is, we are. I am starting junior high next year and my grades are really going to count for something. I’ve always done well in school, but now I have to do better. And my suggestions above don’t mean that you have to give up your entire summer vacation to study and eat nothing but fruits and vegetables. It means just doing a bit of extra to stay sharp and in shape. Just try it for 21 days. My dad always says that it takes 21 days to form a habit. So do these things for 21 days and you might be surprised how natural it becomes!
I hope you have an awesome summer!
Kira Giesen lives in N.W. Calgary and just finished Grade 6 at Bearspaw Christian School.
]]>The Calgary Board of Education is cancelling all school trips to France but will continue planning other international excursions.
This follows the Calgary Catholic School District’s decision last week to cancel all field trips to other countries, including the United States, after terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif. Initially, the CBE put all trips on hold but has now decided to move forward with all international travel excluding France.
“Due to current Canadian and French travel advisories for France, these trips will not be proceeding at this time,” David Stevenson, CBE chief superintendent, said at a news conference Monday afternoon.
Four trips — two field trips and two exchanges — won’t be going forward, keeping 99 students at home, according to the CBE. One additional trip originally would have taken students to France, but the tour company will adjust the itinerary to skip over it. Stevenson said he knows this will be disappointing for the students looking forward to travelling and studying abroad.
“This was a very difficult decision,” Stevenson said. “The CBE values international travel. For many students these trips are once in a lifetime opportunities.”
Sheila McLeod, director of learning, said it is possible the exchange French immersion programs will be postponed until fall 2016.
“We’re looking to rescheduled those into the fall, hoping that the situation in France will have resolved,” McLeod said.
A number of factors influenced the CBE’s decision, including feedback from students, parents and staff, the financial impact of cancelling trips, and travel advisories.
Despite deadly shootings in the United States, trips south of the border will also resume. Stevenson said both the Canadian and U.S. travel advisories are low-risk.
“There are four categories of risk level with the Canadian government’s travel advisories. They remain at the lowest level, and that’s the level we are willing to accept for sending our students internationally.”
Students and parents had to pay deposits for the trips — most of them non-refundable. McLeod said the CBE looked at the financial repercussions of cancelling international travel.
“We looked at the implications of cancelling all of our trips, and for the trips that have been cancelled there are some non-refundable deposits,” McLeod said. “We’re also working with our service providers overseas to see if we can minimize the impact on parents.”
Stevenson said money put down was dependent on each trip, but the figure was somewhere in the hundreds. He said it could have been more had the CBE not made a quick decision.
“We put a pause on as early as we could to ensure parents weren’t putting significant dollars down. We believe, although there will be impact on parents, by making the decision early in the process we have minimized their losses.”
Even though all other international trips will proceed, Stevenson said the CBE would continue to monitor travel advisories to ensure student and staff safety.
“We will respond to any changes that we deem necessary. Responses may range from changing itineraries to cancellation of trips.”
]]>The Calgary Catholic School District has cancelled international student trips until at least September 2016 after discussions about “recent global events.”
“We spoke with the schools that were affected, administrators, some staff, some parents, the board of trustees, the tour companies themselves, our business services department in terms of the insurance component and other districts across the province to get a sense of how people felt and what their sentiments were about the international travel,” said Tania Younker, director of communications for the school district.
The decision comes after terror attacks in Paris, France and San Bernardino, Calif.
Younker said 11 trips have been cancelled and that there have been mixed reactions.
“Some felt that the students should go or the students thought they should go while others were asking us to cancel.”
Younker also said many of those planning to go on trips have already made deposits, but some might not get that money back.
“If the trip was closer, more money has been put down. If the trip is farther away it’s less. If it’s a large tour operator it seems that there’s more flexibility in terms of what could happen with the money put down. Smaller tour operators are less flexible, so it’s hard to say.”
In the end, the decision is about student and staff safety, Younker said.
“We felt that we had a legal and moral obligation to provide that safe and caring environment for students and staff and this was the decision we arrived at.”
Meanwhile, the Calgary Board of Education is discussing whether it will cancel international trips for the remainder of the school year by accepting feedback from parents and anyone involved until Dec. 10. It plans to make a final decision by Dec. 18.
Edmonton Catholic schools have also cancelled all international field trips following the international mass shootings.
]]>They’re heading back and now’s the time to get them ready. Whether it is their first day ever or just the first day for this grade, here are 5 things to consider:
1. TAKE A GOOD LOOK AT YOUR KID — a lot has changed since last June and definitely since last September. Check and see what your child can do independently. Do you really need to help her pack up her back pack (no) or get his lunch box ready (maybe)? When we do for our kids what they could do for themselves, we are demeaning them: taking away their meaning. Our actions tell them that they can’t do it on their own and decreases their sense of self.
2. UNLOAD YOUR PLATE — What will you require your child to do this year? Will your daughter get her own breakfast ready? Will your son make his lunch or sweep the kitchen floor while you finish off the lunches? Get an idea of one or two chores that your child will take off of your plate. Ultimately, this will leave you feeling less stressed and a bit more patient.
3. TAKE TIME TO TEACH — Now that you know what to hand off to your kids, take the time to teach it. Break the chore down into smaller tasks, create a checklist if necessary and work with them as they begin to feel more capable. Don’t load them down with tons of new chores — just one or two. That way, you’ll be setting them up for success. Start now so that they can practice when there is no school and feel capable when they head back.
4. SLEEP MATTERS — Check out how much sleep your child needs and find a way to make that happen. Sleep affects our bodies and our brains. Making it a priority will be a great gift to your child as well as an important habit.
5. ROUTINES HELP — Whether it is getting out the door, getting to dance class, getting homework done or getting kids to sleep; creating a routine with your child will make things easier on everyone. Ask your youngster to help you make a list of the tasks required (Getting to dance class: fill water bottle, pack bag with shoes, and water bottle, change into gear). Write down an order, how long each thing will take, as well as who is responsible for each task (get the child helping as much as possible). Decide on how you will cue tasks and what the consequences are for following plan and not following plan. Knowing all of this will help to keep everyone calm in the heat of the moment.
Have a great year!
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The province says a new Grade 3 digital testing pilot program will remain optional after concerns raised by the Alberta Teacher’s Association and others.
The Grade 3 provincial tests, dubbed Student Learning Assessments (SLAs), are a beginning-of-the-year evaluation in place of the Provincial Achievement Tests students in the third grade previously took at the end of the school year.
Touted as being more “student friendly,” the tests are conducted digitally and allow parents and teachers to identify a student’s strengths and areas of growth in the fall.
Grade 3 pupils began piloting the new SLAs in 2014, and the government plans to eventually phase the test in for students in Grades 6 and 9.
But Education Minister David Eggen said in a statement to the Herald that he decided to extend the pilot program for an additional year, rather than make them mandatory across all Alberta schools.
“School boards will have the option of administering the SLAs for this school year. I have confidence the SLAs are an effective assessment for students, and will use this year’s Grade 3 assessments as a way to ensure the changes we have made address the concerns teachers expressed from last year’s assessment,” said Egan.
The Alberta Teacher’s Association previously urged the province to reconsider making the tests mandatory for this school year. ATA president Mark Ramsankar said the ATA supports the new tests but doesn’t agree with the mandatory pilot, or the fact the tests must be done digitally.
“By making it mandatory, you’re taking away options for places that can’t deliver (the test) in the format being proposed,” said Ramsankar.
The assessment consists of digital literary and numeracy questions marked by Alberta Education, and literacy and numeracy performance tasks marked locally.
Ramsankar said making the digital assessment mandatory will negatively impact some schools, particularly small schools with tiny computer labs that struggled to administer the test last year, or Hutterite schools that lack technology.
“It’s a huge impact on the system,” he said. “The set up and impact on schools that don’t have technical support was tremendously felt. It was a huge burden on teachers last year.”
Eggen said the decision to keep the test format optional was made based on feedback from teachers, school boards and the ATA. But he said the plan for SLAs to eventually replace the old format remains in place.
“We want to make sure they’re the most useful for students, parents and teachers, and we are working hard to get it right,” he said.
Wildrose education critic Mark Smith said he heard “serious concerns” from teachers regarding a host of issues with the new tests, including their digital format.
“The (government) really has to get this one right because if you don’t get it right at Grade 3 then the problem continues to compound,” he said.
Approximately 95 per cent of schools chose to participate in the 2014 pilot.
Smith said it’s widely known there were issues in the pilot project’s first year and he’s hopeful the problems will be ironed out soon.
Concerns about the timing of the test, which must be delivered between Sept. 14 and Oct. 9, have also been raised.
“If these issues haven’t been addressed or dealt with properly, at the end of the day, the assessments are going to mean nothing,” he said.
With files from Sammy Hudes, Calgary Herald
]]>Over the years, many teachers have tried to organize events encouraging kids to ride their bikes to school, only to be shut down by snivelling principals and administrators worried about liability. Someone might crash on his way to school, after all. You know the result: fewer and fewer kids are riding to school, at a time when childhood obesity rates are rising and activity levels among kids are horrendously low.
Kyle Stewart, a teacher at Simon Fraser School in northwest Calgary, is defying all of that. Horrified by the low number of kids he sees on bikes, earlier this year he decided to do whatever it takes to make a bike-to-school event happen. What it took, it turns out, was a phone call to the right person at the right time.
“I went right to the liability guy (for the Calgary Board of Education),” Stewart told me recently. “He was totally on board. It was no big deal.”
It turns out, all of those well-meaning teachers who’ve tried this in the past were stymied by the worst kind of legal bugaboo: the chill. The mere thought of being held liable for an accident during an event related to school was enough to strike fear into the hearts of nervous principals, even though there was little basis in law for those fears. “Because it’s transportation to and from school, I don’t even have to do any paperwork,” Stewart said.
Score a victory for common sense (and the law). The result is that Stewart not only has an ambitious bike-to-school event planned at Simon Fraser, he’s also signed up more than 50 other schools. “It’s getting really big really fast.”
Stewart is leaving it to schools to plan their own specific events, but here’s the basics: on June 2, school administrators and teachers are doing whatever they can to encourage kids to ride to school. This can mean pancake breakfasts, door prizes, or a plain old pat on the back. Stewart is collecting names of all the participants because he wants to know how many kids are taking part, and also to give away some cool prizes. A number of bike shops have already donated, including BikeBike’s offering of a new set of wheels.
With the help of his students, who are driving the project, he’s already got 8,000 kids signed up, but he wants to blow up that number in the future. “I want 20,000 kids in three years,” he says. “We’ve emailed every principal in every elementary school in the city. The kids are super pumped by this.”
Stewart knows that one bike ride won’t change anyone’s life, but he hopes it will show kids, and, perhaps more importantly, their parents, that biking to school isn’t as difficult or dangerous as they might think. He may even make a dent in the absurd too-many-cars-make-school-drop off-unsafe-so-I’ll-drive-my-kid situation so many parents find themselves in.
“A lot of parents think the distance is too far. There’s the cool factor with the junior high kids. But there are just so many benefits,” he says. “Last year, we tried this and saw a huge increase at the bike racks after Bike to School Day.”
Before June 2, he hopes to spread the gospel to Catholic, charter and private schools, and make the event annual, entrenched and self-sustaining. “I really hope parents give principals a hard time if their school is not participating.”
With any luck, he may even grant his daughter’s wish of biking to school like her dad. “My daughter is in Grade 1. She’s been hounding me. ‘Why can’t I do this?'”
Stewart’s group is still taking signups. Visit calgarybiketoschool.weebly.com to get involved.
A snivelling note: A few people have written to say they were offended by my use of the word “snivelling” to describe those who have put up roadblocks to previous bike-to-school initiatives. The writer in me liked the image the word evoked in the context of a school administrator who let their worries about liability shut down an initiative before even checking the legality of the whole thing, but perhaps it was a bit harsh. It’s worth noting that some school administrators have long supported active transportation, and they don’t deserve to be tarred by the same snivelling brush. So consider this my own snivelling acknowledgement that not every school official is a snivelling enemy of biking students, and many are great champions of them who rarely, if ever, snivel.
Drop me a line on Twitter at Twitter.com/TomBabin, on Facebook at Facebook.com/tom.babin, or by email at tbabin@calgaryherald.com.
Check out my new book Frostbike: The Joy, Pain and Numbness of Winter Cycling.
At one time, the image of a group of kids on bikes filling up a residential street on their way to school was nothing special. But in 2012, where helicopter parents and long bus rides are the norm? On a brisk -15C November morning? While it’s snowing?
But there they were one morning last week, a gang of Grade 5 and 6 students with oversized backpacks slung over their parkas, feet crammed into their Costco boots, and toques stuffed inside their helmets. Some were on nice mountain bikes with disc brakes and suspension. Others rode rickety hand-me-downs. And all of them, when asked why they didn’t just take the nice warm bus like regular kids, gave me some version of the same answer. “The bus is boring.”
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In a city where most school mornings are typified by bleary-eyed children stumbling out of idling SUVs and buses with high-rolling odometres, seeing a gaggle of kids tearing up the powder on residential street can be novel, to say the least.
I found this gang after a prompt from Calgarian Michael Gray , who was inspired when he came across a gang of prepubescent cyclists on their way to school one snowy morning. He alerted me on Twitter, and, a couple of tweets and a few days later, I found myself heading out the back door with Grade 6 student Oscar Dewing on his way to school, joining him in a wave goodbye to his mother.
Oscar, it turns out, is a kind of quiet ring-leader of this gang. He started riding his bike to school last year. He liked it. So this year, he figured he could do it every day. His parents liked the idea too, so they agreed to split the school bus rebate with him. A couple of Oscar’s friends caught on. Then a couple more. On the day I visited, 11 kids showed up at the usual meeting spot.
For the kids, there’s nothing big-picture about riding their bikes to school. They think it’s fun. Some of them like the outsider status it gives them. Others like seeing the shocked faces of school officials when they emerge through the snowfall. Oscar doesn’t think much about those things. “It’s fun, and it’s an adventure,” he says, with a look that wonders why people think it’s a big deal.
Parents of the gang members, however, see something bigger. “It gives him an identity,” said Troy Nixon of his son Ben.
Oscar’s mom Lori Beattie, herself an avid urban outdoorswoman (she operates a company called Fit Frog Adventures that guides and encourages walking and hiking), can talk for hours about the big picture. She likes the independence it provides her son, especially in an era when that is rare. She likes that it creates a little adventure for him every day, which forces him to overcome challenges, like bad weather, scraped knees and flat tires, without an adult around to bail him out. And she likes that it gets his body moving.
“I know there’s a lot of fear about this kind of thing, that people don’t want their kids to bike and they worry about traffic, but it’s not that big of a deal,” Beattie says. “There are so many benefits. And it’s three-and-a-half kilometres, for God’s sake. Yes, he might fall, but he finds things to be little adventures.”
The Elboya bicycle gang (OK, that’s just what I called them) isn’t the only group of kids that ride bikes to school in Calgary, of course. But such groups aren’t as common as they once were. A few parents said school officials, while never opposed to the idea, were a little slow to embrace it. And I blogged last year about some of the challenges Calgary teachers have faced trying to organize more formal bike-to-school events because concerns about liability tend to trump the common-sense benefits that come from having more kids on bikes. It’s a far cry from the horror stories from some U.S. districts in which children have been banned from riding their bikes over concerns that they will be injured and blame the school, but Beattie, for one, wishes walking and cycling was encouraged more. She thinks it’s good for everyone, and good for the city.
Oscar may wish that too, but he doesn’t show it, at least to me. We chatted amiably as we took the back roads from his house toward school. He instinctively took the safe routes, avoiding busy streets, and crossing roads in low-traffic areas. When I got off my bike to walk down an hill that was a little too icy for my bones, he reluctantly followed suit, to spare me the embarrassment.
When we joined up with the larger group of 11 students, the kids, warmed by the prospect of getting their names in the paper (here you go: Ty Sheppard, Ben Nixon, Nick Sherwin, John Plunkett, Tazman Abramowicz, Chloe Richardson, Owen Cleveland, Gabby Cleveland, Jonah Dahlin and Luke Sherwin), turned the ride into a bit of a party. They laughed and teased and showed off. It was a kick to see them take over a residential street, with cars keeping a wide berth, proving that old adage about strength in numbers.
And there were adventures. We had a wipeout, a dropped chain and some cold fingers (only some of that came from me). But the kids solved their own problems and made it to school safely, with time to spare. By the end, I could relate to Oscar’s nonchalance about the whole thing. And his practical advice to other kids made more sense than ever.
“Just try it. If you don’t like it, don’t do it.”
]]>A Calgary mother is upset after a letter from her son’s school about traffic safety seemed to put all of the onus for safety on to pre-teen cyclists at the school, not the parents who create a dangerous gauntlet of vehicles in front of the school every morning.
As nearly every parents knows these days, sending a kid into a school can be like sending them through a gauntlet — endless rows of cars and trucks dropping kids off create situations that can be hostile to anybody on foot or on a bike. Getting into the front door of school might be the most dangerous thing a kid does on a typical day. (I’ve written about the issue several times, including here and here ).
Improving that situation is part of the reason Calgary mom Lori Beattie encourages her son to ride his bike to school. Her son is part of the Elboya Bike Gang that I wrote about last yea r, who ride year-round. To Beattie, encouraging her son to ride is not only a great way of keeping him active and give him some independence, but it helps make the environment around the school a little safer during the morning and afternoon rushes by reducing the number of cars jostling for position.
Yet traffic at the school is, like most schools, a serious problems. School administrators, she says, often send out notes to parents reminding them to be safe.
But Beattie was upset with a note that came home recently, which you can see below or read here , that seemed to put the onus for safety on the cyclists, not the drivers.
“Many concerns arise because of near accidents between drivers and cyclists and potential injuries,” the memo read. The note went on to list a number of rules cyclists should obey, including shoulder checking, using hand signals, and riding in single file. Near the end of the letter, the memo made a cursory note to drivers: “Motorists must also respect the rights of cyclists on the road.”
Notwithstanding the fact that the onus for safety was put on children rather than adults, Beattie was upset the memo seemed to put responsibility onto cyclists who aren’t the source of the problem. Beattie wrote a blog post about the memo, which you can read here.
“The parents who drive and drop their kids every day and who clog the streets around every Calgary school are the biggest threat to children living active lifestyles,” she wrote. “And it is not just parents of children, but many Calgarians expect to zip through Calgary’s side-streets in their car at anytime of day or in any season.”
Beattie says she thinks the school administration generally does an excellent job, but she felt the memo reflected a common attitude in which the rights of car drivers trump everyone else. She thinks walking and cycling should be encouraged by schools to solve problems, not just with traffic, but with inactivity among children. Everyone needs to obey the rules of the road, but she thinks the first point in the memo should have been “Drive less.”
What do you think about the memo? Was the school — or society — wrong to focus on cyclists like that, or should it keep its focus on motorists? When it comes to safety in front of schools, who should be responsible? How can it be fixed?
Leave a comment below or follow me on Twitter, Google Plus,or Facebook, or drop me a line via email me at tbabin@calgaryherald.com.
“It’s the most wonderful time of the year,” so the Staples commercial goes.
It’s back-to-school time, as students change gears from the lazy days of summer and shift back to hitting the books. Today’s classrooms are equipped with the latest technology to enhance instruction. Here are some favourite student and teacher gadgets for use in day-to-day learning:
1) Smartphones – Smartphone use in the classroom is still somewhat controversial, but the Calgary Board of Education actually encourages it as a learning tool. In an interview with CTV , Queen’s University National Scholar and Associate Professor Sidneyeve Matrix compared the situation to when calculators were first used by students in the classroom. “We had a whole new level of computational skill, and now we’re going to have a whole new level of mobile digital skills when we turn to mobile learning on the handhelds.”
2) Laptops and tablets – Technology users are moving towards being more mobile, and teachers and students are a significant part of that trend. Last month, Lenovo, the world’s top PC vendor reported that they sold more smartphones and tablets than PCs for the first time ever.
3) Interactive whiteboards – Calgary-based SMART Technologies ’ SMART Boards are popular with both teachers and students. Teachers can project presentations onto the SMART Boards and they can write, touch and interact with their content.
4) Document cameras – Document cameras are a fun way for teachers to show students new and interesting ways of looking at objects. Whether they are zooming in on the smaller details of a 3D object, or observing science experiments, students can share an equal view of the lesson – without crowding the teacher’s desk.
5) mp3 players – Whether a student is listening to his own music while studying, or a teacher is playing an audio book to her students, mp3 players are an increasingly common sight in schools. Both teachers and students can make full use of mp3 players in their school activities.
While the best learning models still involve personal communication, technology can be introduced in any number of ways to enhance student learning and make lectures more interactive. What are some of your favourite educational tech gadgets?
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Author: Heidi Gammuac
Heidi is a volunteer at Digital Alberta. Always interested in what is new and coming up in the world of digital media, she is an Account Executive at The Agency, a boutique PR firm that specializes in the technology sector. Full Bio & Twitter .
]]>My son came home with someone else’s leftovers in his lunch bag the other day. A whole wheat ham and cheese bun with a few nibbles taken out of it. William denied knowing anything about this wayward sandwich, claiming no one ever ate ham and cheese buns at his school. Especially not him.
We’ve just entered the years of making school lunches, and for the next four weeks, I’m going to explore what goes into the lunch bag, what comes home and what we can do to make a better lunch. I will look at various aspects, from cost and convenience to nutrition and packaging. I hope to hear from other lunch-makers about what works for their audience.
Today’s kindergarten lunch and two snacks:
– tortilla cut into triangles
– two cheese strings
– bag of grapes
– half-cup of yogurt (vanilla mixed with plain)
– orange slices
– 2 per cent white milk (school milk program)
Tonight we’ll see what comes back. Hopefully no ham and cheese crumbs!
]]>The Herald’s editorial board met with Mount Royal University’s new president, David Docherty today. Stepping up from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont., the new guy has big dreams, among them a direct LRT link for MRU students.
Considering MRU is largely a commuter school that draws the majority of its students from Calgary & catchment, a direct train link would be a great idea…You know, if it weren’t totally impossible. To wit, Neil McKendrick, the manager of transit planning for the city:
It’s just a matter of providing an LRT line that will serve the greatest number of people, McKendrick explains. This was all decided in 2007 when city officials were planning the West extension of the LRT to service the starving suburbs of Glendale and Westgate — desperate as the people in those areas are for affordable transportation alternatives. Rather than provide a link directly to a university of 10,000 full-time students, Calgary transit will dedicate buses from one of the new stations when the extension opens in 2012.
Of course, one can forgive Docherty his optimism. He’ll soon find things work a little differently out West. Bursaries, scholarships and student loan programs rarely consider the reality facing most students in Calgary, where a car, gas, parking and insurance are not luxuries.
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