Photo: Castanet

The Kamloops-Thompson District Parent Advisory Council is one of several across the province asking the ministry to find solutions to an underfunding "crisis" and soaring costs.

The province said its 2025 budget will provide $370 million in operating funds and $4.6 billion in capital investments to B.C. school districts over three years.

But with per student funding remaining stagnant, increases to relief and salary costs and rising inflation putting more pressure on school districts, local DPAC chair Bonnie McBride said the province’s increase to operating funds are inadequate.

“We have to recognize, first and foremost, that we're not giving them enough money to do their day to day operations,” she said.

McBride said the billions in capital investments won’t go towards any newly announced school builds, which are desperately needed across the province.

With little space, more portables need to be added or moved to handle the overflow of students. SD73 has spent $5.7 million on portables moves in the last five years — dollars McBride said could be used towards student learning.

“Every single dollar we spend on moving portables is one less dollar we spend on teachers,” she said.

“You said a CEA in every classroom, you said you're going to accelerate the building of new schools and none of that was delivered in that budget or that service plan.”

Need a big change

McBride said the formula has to change.

“We need two things. The first one is we need a structural change of how we actually fund education,” she said.

“The second thing we need is a recognition that the under investment for an extended period has created a crisis, and we need to have a one time injection of funds to support that.”

SD73 board chair Heather Grieve said costs have risen for staffing from collective bargaining, which makes up 89 per cent of SD73’s budget, relief costs have doubled in five years, and inflation has pushed transportation costs to increase, which makes up 3.3 per cent of SD73’s budget — but funding from the ministry has stayed the same.

“We’re having to do a lot with our dollars staying the same, and costs are increasing, and so it becomes really challenging,” Grieve said.

She said space pressures in schools on Kamloops’ south shore were “very much at a crisis point,” and funds have gone to portables moves and catchment changes to manage the space crunch.

Grieve said SD73 was looking at selling off properties to mitigate cost pressures.

“I think we really do need to see something fundamentally change at a provincial level,” she said.

“We need to continue to have these very important conversations with the [BC School Trustee Association] to find out how, as a provincial body, we can advocate with the ministry and continue to have conversations with districts who share the same priorities and the same challenges.”

'Boutique funding' not helpful

Last month, the SD73 board of education met with five local MLAs to review advocacy priorities, including lobbying the Ministry of Education and Child Care to increase per student funding to keep pace with inflation.

Kamloops Centre MLA Peter Milobar said short-term or one-time funding from the province doesn’t solve the problem either, and can leave local districts to pick up the tab once the funding runs out.

“The only way that program can continues is if they are asked to reach into their own pockets and start funding it,” Milobar said.

“It puts the school, it’s puts the school administrators, the teachers and the school board in a very untenable situation where they’re the ones on the pointy end of the stick.”

McBride calls this “boutique funding” and says the ministry needs to move away from using this method to cover costs, such as through Classroom Enhancement Funding.

Lobbying the ministry

McBride said the funding challenges affect vulnerable students the most.

“We’ve got a three year wait for a diagnosis in our province if you’re looking for an autism diagnosis or FASD,” she said.

“The schools are required and expected to meet their needs without any funding because they don’t have a diagnosis.”

The B.C. ombudsperson is currently investigating complaints of students being excluded in B.C. K-12 schools, and McBride says it’s a result of lack of funding. SD73 has been given until June to provide its response to the investigation.

McBride said a group of DPACs across the province are working together to call on the ministry to find solutions and sent a letter to the premier, ministry of education and ministry of finance last week.

“If we don't hear anything we're going to do it again, and we're going to do it again,” she said.

“It's a flat out crisis, so you're going to keep hearing from us.”