Edmonton's Enterprise - Edmonton Public Schools system

School Administrator, May, 2001 by Emery Dosdall

Today, we would not see this as a barrier as we could approve an Edmonton Public School program housed in another facility or within another agency.

Parental Demands

We have learned that most parents and community groups are willing to give public schools the first chance to meet their needs. Most don't want the responsibility of hiring or firing staff, of managing payroll or of maintaining a building. However, some parents want governance and those individuals have the option to choose the charter route.

Responding to these groups has forced us to do business differently. One group wanted a dance program, so we built a dance studio in one of our schools. We said "yes" to an all-girls junior high program we named after an early Albertan suffragette and politician, Nellie McClung. We now have three Nellie locations. We found a way to let parents at the Tevie Miller Heritage alternative school continue to augment the amount of speech therapy their children receive.

But we didn't stop there.

We encouraged our staff to collaborate with a community group to develop Logos, a program that provides instruction of the provincial curriculum within a Christian context. Logos now has been expanded to eight locations. The School Act does not allow religion as the basis of a charter school, but it does enable the public system to create alternative programs based on religion.

Due to the success of Logos we have been able to bring two long-established private Christian schools into the public domain, and this has challenged other school districts also to consider these options or face a considerable student exodus.

Collaboration between our district staff and the community group enabled us to extend public education to a group of home-schoolers whose parents had not previously felt they could safely entrust their children to the public education system. Our success also has helped us to reach out to several home-schooling parents through our LearnNet program in which students take instruction via computer and visit our library services and science center. This program helps a range of students who cannot (or choose not to) attend public schools. The program has grown to include 2,000 students in the past four years.

The inclusion of these programs did not come without their own challenges. The Alberta Teachers' Association was publicly opposed to providing Christian education within the public school setting. The union raised questions about the separation of church and state and asked, "Will you give Lutherans or Pentecostals their own schools too?"

Some of our trustees also had reservations, as did our unions for support, maintenance and custodial staff. Union membership is mandatory in our district and this became one of the greatest challenges that the private Christian schools faced in joining our district. All parties had to overcome traditional thinking. In this case, all staff members now belong to the ATA and their respective union locals.

We encourage parents and students to shop around for the school that will best meet their needs. As a result, 41 percent of our elementary students, 48 percent of junior high and 58 percent of high school students attend schools other than their designated school. Some students travel across the city by local transit to be involved in a desired program, such as performing and visual arts, a second language or a dance and cadet program.