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South Okanagan Photos

SD #53 Okanagan Similkameen – Administration Report

STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT:

 

Class of 2014: Congratulations to all of our graduates.  This year we have 193 students graduating from our secondary schools.  This includes 54 graduates from Osoyoos Secondary School, 81 graduates from Southern Okanagan Secondary School, 33 graduates from Similkameen Elementary Secondary School, and 25 graduates from YouLearn.ca.  We are proud of their accomplishments and look forward to hearing of their future success.

 

District Innovation / Initiatives

 

Meeting with Okanagan Corrections Centre (OCC):  Bev Young recently met with John Pastorek, Project Director for OCC, Ted Howard, Chief Project Officer with Capital Division, Steve DiCastri, warden, Glen Heinrichs and Will Eaton to meet one another and begin preliminary discussions about educational opportunities and partnerships once the Okanagan Corrections Centre is up and operational.  We had a very positive first meeting and I am confident that we will be having further discussions regarding establishing an education program at OCC in partnership with SD 53.

 

2014-2015 District Achievement Contract:  This plan outlining goals, objectives, strategies and evidence to be monitored is due into the Ministry of Education July 15, 2014. Our plan is designed to be a three year plan with the goals established through a committee following the district visioning exercise. We revise and update the plan on an annual basis.  The specifics will be discussed at the regular Board of Education meeting on June 25th; however, the goals for 2014-2015 remain:

 

  1. Goal #1:              To improve the health, social, and emotional wellbeing of all students.
  2. Goal #2:  To create welcoming school environments where students, parents and staff belong and feel connected.
  3. Goal #3:               To increase transition and completion rates for all students.
  4. Goal #4:  To maintain the focus and success established for the foundational skills of literacy and numeracy.
  5. Goal #5    To increase students’ contributions to the local and global communities              .

 

District Aboriginal Graduation Ceremony: This celebrationwent very well at Similkameen Elementary Secondary School on June 17. The event is sponsored by the Aboriginal Education Advisory Council. The support workers and Helen Gallagher did a wonderful job of setting up and providing the students, parents and families with a celebration they will always remember. Chief Clarence Louie of the Osoyoos Indian Band, Chief Keith Crow of the Lower Similkameen Band, Marlene Cox-Bishop, Metis Representative, and Myrna Coates, trustee and AEAC council member, all talked about the importance of education as well as the pride families and community had in the accomplishments of the graduates. Graduates were honoured for their many accomplishments. As a special presentation to Alex Rousseau and Darlene Melgar, they were given a Pendleton blanket in recognition and thanks for their contributions and leadership as student representatives to the AEAC. Although not yet graduating, Kalie Gabriel-Baptiste, our junior representative, was also recognized for her contributions.

 

Early Learning: During the last week of August, the facilitators will participate in two day–long workshops. The first is the Celebrate Early Learning Summer Institute on Monday, August 25 in Kelowna. This conference will feature Cris Rowan, author of Virtual Child – The Terrifying Truth About What Technology Is Doing To Children. Cris is a Pediatric Occupational Therapist and her presentation is titled “Technology and Its Impact on Early Child Development. The second workshop is on Thursday, August 28 at Okanagan Falls Elementary. Making Sense of Kids from the Inside Out with Dr. Deborah MacNamara is sponsored by Okanagan Falls Elementary and the school district. Dr. MacNamara’s talk will feature two topics: “The Teachability Factor: Why Teaching is Getting Harder and What We Can Do About It” and “Making Sense of Anxiety”. This workshop is open to all district personnel and members of the public at a cost of $20.00. Register by contacting Cindy Gilbert at the school district office, 250-498-3481, ext. 115.

 

Career Programs

We have once again applied for an Industry Training Association Secondary School Apprenticeship Support Grant of $20,000. This grant provides us with the ability to meet regularly and provide greater supervision of students in SSA, ACEIT and dual credit programs. It is also used to provide time to support the YES2IT program in January. Unfortunately, with the teacher strike, we fell a few students short of our new student registrations for this year but will have a great start to next year! This year, we introduced the Gateway program. This introduction to the trades programs provided essential construction site skills to 16 students. These students received 16 credits towards high school graduation and an Okanagan College certificate. Many are looking at taking level 1 trades programs or doing a SSA in the coming year.

 

Next year we will be offering two YES2IT programs. Besides our January YES2IT program, we will be offering a new elementary school-based “hands-on” program for grades 6 and 7 students called “Yes2IT in the Classroom”. Essentially, next fall Mr. Turnbull will be spending a week in each elementary school with each grade 6 and 7 class, building a project with students learning about carpentry and other construction trades skills.

 

Finally, in the hopes of further growing our careers programs, we will be increasing Mr. Rod Kitt’s time to provide district coordination for the careers programs. This will be funded through existing budgets and revenue through trades initiatives.

 

Literacy Update: Next school year, we hope to complete the primary review and do the intermediate review. The primary review has been very supportive of our assessment practices but identified the need for a better approach to training. This will be addressed by providing training for PM benchmarks in September.

 

Summer Reading Programs:Due to the uncertainty of the current labour dispute, we have made the difficult decision to cancel the summer reading programs for this year.  Aside from potential of picket lines and teachers’ unwillingness to participate if the strike continues, it will be difficult to contact and register children and families to participate in the programs. As these programs are funded through the Ministry of Education’s summer school funds, it would be too much of a burden on the district if students did not show up. Finally, school hygiene is paramount and, if picketed, school custodians will not be able to clean the classrooms and washrooms. This is most unfortunate as these programs give many of our most vulnerable learners extra time and assistance in meeting learning outcomes for their age group in reading.

 

 

School Based Initiatives:

 

Storm the Wall:  Bev Young attended this event at Osoyoos Secondary on June 11th which had very good student participation with teams from Osoyoos Elementary School participating in the morning and teams from Osoyoos Secondary School participating in the afternoon.  I would like to recognize John Seminoff and Nicole Johnson for their hard work and extensive organization put into the success of this event.  John’s vision is for this to become an annual district event. 

 

OPERATIONS:

 

May Enrolment:As indicated in the attached enrolment report, as at May 31, 2014, student enrolment is 2,386.53 which is an overall increase from September 2013 of 26.97 FTE. Elementary school enrolment decreased by 2.0 FTE, secondary school enrolment decreased by 52.0625 FTE and YouLearn enrolment increased by 81.03 FTE. 

 

2014/15 Budget: The 2014/15 budget totalling $28.3 million has been finalized.  The Board is designating $324,000 fromprior years’ surplus funds for 2014/15 operating budget expenses.  The budget is before the board for three bylaw readings at tonight’s meeting and must be sent to the Ministry of Education by June 30.

 

MyEducation BC Update: On Monday, June 16 we started the “test conversion/validation” cycle. Unfortunately with the teacher strike, we have only completed 15% of the tasks that are required. We are presently in the position that we may not be able to complete the groundwork necessary to “go-live” with this new program in August. We will make this decision the last week of June, and set a new “go-live” date once our steering committee is again able to meet.

 

Technology Lease:  The district will receive over 500 new desktops and laptops for use by student and staff in September.   The district has entered into a four year lease totaling $482,000 and as the new equipment is put into place, the old equipment is removed from schools and returned to the leaseholder.  The technology department will be hard at work over the summer months preparing the equipment for the new school year.

 

Staffing:  Teacher staffing processes for 2014/15 are complete and we are pleased that all teachers who received layoff notices as part of the spring staffing process have received positions in the district for September.  The CUPE staffing is also mostly complete with a few individuals remaining on layoff.  Schools will review student needs in September, particularly if new students arrive, and further positions may come available at that time.

 

Bev Young, Superintendent