Tonight’s school meeting was a disappointing event. The ‘final’ proposal is to approve, subject to securing funding, the rebuilding of the high school at the NRC site and to convert the current high school into a second elementary school.

This does sound okay at first. However, there are some serious problems.

• the timeline adds a full year and a half to the move in time. What was originally promised as a Sept. 2009 opening for a rebuild high school in the old NRC Building is now projected as a late 2010 opening.
• the second elementary school will not open until sometime in 2012.
• all of this is contingent upon securing funding. However, as of June 11th there is no agreement in place to proceed. The school board said that there is a piece of property owned by the school board that might be transferred to the province but they would not say anything further about that except that if the transfer of the undisclosed property takes place there will be enough money to rebuild the schools.

We need you to keep the pressure on. The school board needs to know that we need our schools and that the delays are not appropriate.

You and your neighbours will have received this week a postcard from the UNA, the UEL residents, and the two U Hill Parent Advisory Councils asking you to email the school board and the province. Please do this. We have set up an easy email web site for you to use. The URL is http://www.rebuilduhill.ca.

The complete report can be download here.
. It is also on the VSB web site http://www.vsb.bc.ca

There will be an opportunity to make a public presentation to the school board on June 19th. The school board will make it’s final decision on June 25th.

Home – Save Queen Elizabeth Annex: Home

Good News – June 11, 2008

VSB staff presented their final proposal to the Board of Trustees tonight. We are all delighted to see that closure of QEA has been taken off the table!! Please see the VSB’s short news release on the VSB’s website.

We are delighted by the latest version of the plan, while it is not all we were hoping for it is a vast improvement over the original proposal to close and sell QEA. Delegations may speak to the board of trustees on June 19th after which the trustees will vote on June 23.

We cannot thank you enough for your support.

The following comment is from an exasperated parent who is tired of waiting for action on the school front at UBC/UEL in Vancouver. They have asked that this be posted anonymously.

Let me express my absolute appall at having seen our VSB Trustees all these years being complicit in allowing, maintaining and exacerbating the current blatantly regressive wealth transfer from one of the poorest census regions in our city towards the incredibly privileged and wealthy families east of Blanca St.

It is hard to believe that VSB Trustees that call themselves “progressive”, that think of themselves as defending the disenfranchised and less privileged, and that claim they’re working for all children in the district, can at the very same time allow this shameful regressive wealth transfer.
Allow me to document my claims with official and publicly available statistics (all 2006 census data from Statistics Canada).

The median income in the UBC/UEL area in 2005 for couple households with children in the different regions targeted by the EFR was:

– UBC/UEL: $49,388
– Dunbar: $134,852 (16th to 29th, Pacific Spirit to Blenheim)
– West Point Grey (West) $142,354 (8th to 16th, Blanca to Discovery)
– West Point Grey (East): $151,097 (8th to 16th, Discovery to Alma)
– West Point Grey (North): $156,205 (North of 8th, UEL to Alma St)

However:
– *our families* are the ones paying out of our own after-tax income to ship over 200 kids miles away from home every day;
– *our working parents* are the ones taking time from work to travel considerable distances to bring our kids to their out-of-catchment schools;
– it is *our community* and *our children* the ones paying the social cost of having our children detached from our neighbours and neighbourhoods;
– It is *our lucky kids* that can stay in our local school the ones who have to attend classes with over 30 kids (constantly reaching the maximum allowed by the District) in elementary school, and have to fight for room in the lunchroom, bathroom, gym and the rest of the severely overcrowded facilities.

And we do this so that:
– a few children of some of the most wealthy families in town don’t have to walk about 8 extra blocks (!!) to attend their local schools; and
– these few children can have class sizes well below the district average.

The hardship that you, your fellow trustees, and the VSB, have imposed (and seem willing to continue imposing) on our poor and under-privileged families and their children is beyond “unfair”. For many years now, the school board and its trustees have (by action or inaction) been making the poor subsidize the privileged. In one of the wealthiest cities on Earth. In Canada. In 2008.

It is high time you put an end to it.

As the EFR plan documents, all this could start to change if the few in-catchment students attending the satellite QEA are absorbed by QE and JQ. We all know that most of the other students filling QEA, QE and JQ are coming from UBC/UEL. There’s more than plenty of room in the catchment schools to accommodate the in-catchment children east of Blanca Street. These schools will still operate in ideal conditions and
well under capacity. However this will also make the life of hundreds of poor and under-privileged families and children much much easier.

Personally, I don’t like this plan any more or less than selling the VSB Broadway building, say. But you, your fellow trustees and the VSB have, for the last 5 years, failed to give us any option. All things considered, we’ll take the EFR plan.

Our children can’t afford to wait any longer. I hope that on June 19 our trustees finally find the courage to give our under-privileged children the schools they need and deserve.

A special school board working group will publicly release it’s final recommendations for the Dunbar/UBC area of the district Wednesday, June 4th. There are few indications of what the report might actually entail. A swirl of rumours have suggested everything from a UBC/St. Georges/Province joint venture/land swap to nothing at all. The clearest indication comes from a meeting with school representative committees early in May where a draft development plan was presented. The plan contained very little real detail with the notable exception of a single page of ‘plans’ that included transforming U Hill into a science/math/technology high school in the former NRC Building on campus and closing the annex facility of Queen Elizabeth School. No details were provided at that meeting.

Ken Denike, chair of the VSB special working group and his collegue U HIl Liason trustee, Carol Gibson, attend a special joint U Hill Secondary and Elementary Parent Advisory Committee meeting May 28. At the meeting trustte Gibson reitereated her support of U HIll’s strong need for new facilities. Dr. Denike was somewhat more circumspect in his comments and was not able to offer much one way or the other.

Also in attendance was former MP and current VP-External for UBC, Stephen Owen. Mr. Owen made it clear that UBC continues to offer a very significant package to the school board and the province and remains strongly supportive of rebuilding schools in the community. A staff person from MLA and Premier Campbell’s constituency office was present, but had nothing to say. Many parents at the meeting expressed a hope that Mr. Campbell might take note of the condition of his alma matter.

Previous Comments

• Will U Hill Be Rebuilt?
• Rebuilding of U Hill Schools Deferred
• Motion Passed By UHS PAC
• Speaking With One Voice
• Open Letter to Clarence Hansen
• Meeting Notes from January

On the eve of a combined U Hill Secondary/Elementary PAC meeting many parents living west of Blanca in Vancouver are wondering -will our schools be rebuilt to meet the learning needs of our children?

The EFR process has been public since early January 2008. As parents we have been waiting for over four years to get an answer we can “take to the bank.” The process has been filled with delays. From administrative to political interruptions, the real need for schools in this area has been sidelined time and time again.

June 4th at 7 pm the senior management of the Vancouver Board of Education will present their ‘final’ draft to the school trustees. People are hopeful that there is a plan in the works that will lay out a course to rebuild the schools out on the edge of Point Grey. But no one is holding their breath.

The is a worrisome feeling that the status quo will win out and nothing will happen. The same expressions of sympathy will be shared, but real action will not follow. The status quo is, however costly and it has to change.The status quo situation is being paid for through all of our collective labour and volunteer time as parents who work as staff or faculty and live on campus. We have allowed our children to pay the costs of keeping enclave facilities alive. Over 200 of our children are put on buses each morning to go out to Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth Elementary Schools, and others go farther afield to Southlands, Carnarvon and Henry Hudson so that annex facilities can survive. Our older children go to a high school that is decrepit and overcrowded. They eat their lunches on the floor, they do their labs in shifts, frequently miss gym, and they take classes in spaces that should be torn down and even so, they do amazingly well in their academic studies. These academic results have allowed politicians and administrators to avoid the real problems.

We all hope that on June 4th and on June 19th, when the trustees vote, our children will finally hear that their needs are being addressed.

School closures and the ‘cult of efficiency’

By Murray Dobbin

The closure of public schools in BC has reached crisis level and is unprecedented in the history of BC. Enrolment has dropped in the past, and some schools are always closed in such situations, but the extent of the closures this time around is unique and the callous attitude of the provincial government has no precedent. The current raft of closures—150 since 2001 and 45 more scheduled for this year—is rationalized by declines in enrolment. But there is a much stronger driving force behind these permanent losses of schools and school property and that is the ideology of the current provincial government. The application of neo-liberal ideology (or radical free-market ideology) is at the root of this tragic loss of schools and the devastation it causes students, parents, neighbourhoods, and communities.

Politicians have pushed the decision deadline on rebuilding University Hill Secondary to the very last minute. U Hill students will be busy writing year end exams by the time trustees finally grapple with the tough decision of whether or not they will rebuild much need infrastructure or not.

Given the push back from west-side voters the likelihood of having much needed facilities anytime soon for hundreds of ‘surplus’ students is diminishing.

Maye it’s time for a rethink. Maybe it’s time for a radical solution that will simultaneously tackle Vancouver’s surplus school capacity, growing population of school children in Vancouver west of Blanca, and allow a group of kindergarten and primary parents to hold onto to their school.My apologies if this seems extreme or, perhaps, even verging on satire. However, given the apparent lack of political will to do what is needed regarding U Hill combined with the strong political intervention of politically well placed parents it seems that it may well be time for a different approach. It is likely that back room discussions are proceeding and special deals may be in the making. One can always hope. In the meantime realists need to consider what can in fact be done if there is no money to rebuild the NRC building at UBC into a new secondary school

If the sale of the annex is not approved the need for school spaces west of Blanca will still be there. The funding issue will also very likely remain. So, how do we meet the need for school capacity that is growing in the campus area?

It seems that there is greater public tolerance for shifting high school students than there is for shifting elementary students. We have clearly seen that suggesting the movement of primary students produces ripples of outrage that are hard for most politicians to confront. So why not move the high school students east?

Here’s an idea on how it might be done. It’s a rough idea and will obviously require tinkering.

• (1) Decommission U Hill Secondary as a secondary and convert into a needed elementary school for 450 plus students (keep portables on site as they will be needed). Do not build new secondary at UBC at this time. The district figures show that there are 2200 more spaces than secondary students thus this would allow the Board to immediately cut overall surplus capacity. This approach could potentially also be applied to one of the other low enrolment secondary schools if necessary.
• (2) Shift High School catchments boundaries eastward. This can be accomplished through modest rearrangement of the elementary feeder schools of Byng, PW, Kits, Point Grey, Hamber and Tupper. Some additional adjustments, perhaps involving relocation of choice programs to underutilized facilities, would be in order.
  • Byng takes feeder schools from QM, UHE(1) and UHE(2)
  • PW takes QE, Kitchener, and Trafalgar (loses Carnarvon and Shaghnessy and TREK)
  • Carnarvon is shifted to Kits along with Trafalgar students living north of King Ed.
  • PG takes southland and Kerrisdale (loses Qulchena) and any over capacity remaining at Byng from U Hill influx.
  • Hamber picks up Shaughnesy and PW Trek and Quilchena
  • Tupper picks up Fraser and Wolfe
  • John Oliver picks up Van Horne and Sexsmith (allow some shifting from Magee to
  • Churchill and then spill over of some PG into Magee)
• (3) Review of district programs, such as FI, IB, Mini’s, and reassignment of these programs to facilities that are being underutilized. Given that many participants in this district programs are already traveling out of catchments, further displacement may, in some cases actually place programs closer to students. Also, since these are choice programs there is no underlying principle that would support need to locate such programs close to student home address. Rationale reallocation of student to underutilized facilities thus makes good sense.
• (4) Public accepts movement of several thousand high school students as these students are resilient and easily portable and plan will preserve primary annex in well off Dunbar area –thus removing the need to sell public land or close annex. Province appreciates the innovative and flexible approach Board takes to issue of under utilization of facilities at Tupper, Hamber, and John Oliver.

If the EFR–Phase One plans go ahead none of the above need apply. But, perhaps it is reasonable to do a major redesign rather than a minor re-tinkering?

Background Documents.
2007 enrolment date for VSB secondary schools.Download file
VSB school catchment map.Download file

Vancouver Sun blogs

The Vancouver Courier ran an article on the need for a new school in the university area. In the article the author presents the issue of need for news schools on campus. After introducing the issue around the need for a new high school and the motion passed by the parents’ advisory council at the high school, the Van Courier author then turns to a commentary from the media rep from Queen Eliz Annex. The discursive effect of this is to use the words of the QEA parent to question the validity of the U Hill PAC decision.

Kaye also questions whether the University Hill PAC represents a majority of parents. “Some of them may have gotten involved with the PAC precisely because they had strong views on the need for more schools, so there may be a minority of parents that feel that their child’s been forced to eat lunch on the floor for so long that they don’t care how many other children have to suffer to remedy that situation,” she said.”

The narrative structure of the article models ‘balance’ while in effect promoting a particular perspective (this is not atypical in the media world -it’s standard practice in fact).

The piece starts as a story about parent concern regarding the facilities at U Hill. The issue of conflict -parent versus parent- is introduced early on, and then picks up with the quote of the QEA parent.

The QEA quote, about midway thought the piece, acts to shift the issue from the need for an improved learning facility to the authenticity of the parents at U Hill. The quote does this in two ways. First by suggesting that the U Hill PAC is comprised of parents who are solely focused on getting a new school. Second that these parents do not represent the majority of the U Hill parents. Conclusions? Anything from the U Hill parents will be biased, non-representational, and should be discounted.

To suggest that the U Hill PAC thinks a new school is appropriate is reasonable. To suggest, however, that the U Hill Parents are only focused on a new school is misplaced and inaccurate -of course the Courier author is careful to avoid making such a claim themselves. They use the words of the QEA parent to make this point. Doing this allows the Courier author to avoid the necessity to check the facts while also allowing them to build the narrative toward an embedded critique of the U Hill Parents; that is, they are a group who are single focused on the needs of their own children and who “don’t care how many other children have to suffer;” as quoted in the Courier article.

All stories have a slant. To ask for pure objectivity is to misunderstand the role that language and writing play in our society. One should assume a semblance of accuracy -and the Courier author has done that though effective quotation of key people in the story. One might wish for a different slant -perhaps one that focussed on the situation at U Hill without itself engaging in pitting one parent’s voice against another’s. That would have been unique. Though I doubt it would have been as ‘engaging’ a ‘news’ story.

I would like to think that honesty and openness are the way to go and that the end goal never justifies the tactics one uses to win. I realize that is a naïve view point -but it is one that I would think lawyers and athletes and academies and most other people would appreciate. Apparently not. If there has been one take home lesson for me in all of this it is that the capacity to believe that ones personal interests trump all others extends across many sectors of society; even those whom one might feel would be more open to ideas of justice and fair-play. My critique is not for the journalist -they are doing their job. My critique is for those who entrap themselves within their particular vantage point and in the process become incapable of seeing other perspectives with empathy or.

In my professional work I teach students about issues related to First Nations and communities. Many of these young people come with fixed viewpoints and perspectives that are very often locked in place. They fear examining their understandings, to explore where they hold misconceptions, and where their own vested interests interrupt their capacity for empathy. I see my role in those places as working through the fear and worry so that at the very least these students can examine in an intellectually safe place their very often misplaced assumptions. My role in that place-at least as I see it- is not to convince or compel, it is to provide a place to hold out divergent viewpoints, to take a risk to examining perspective that may be flawed. In that process my hope is that at the very least the students leave with a better understanding of their own perspective, if they can transform through the process, so much the better. I have seen some amazing work produced by these students. One hopes that something similar will at the very lest emerge on the other side of the VSB’s plan.

This video was produced by U Hill Secondary students for the VSB Trustees meeting on February 11, 2008.

A playlist of this and related videos from U Hill can be found here.