“This is not about consequences and punishment, this is about engaging students.”

Jennifer Bruce, teacher, member of the Council to Improve Classroom Conditions

Although months later than usual, the Tri-County Regional School Board has approved its budget for the current fiscal year.

The budget was approved at the board’s monthly meeting September. The delay in approving this year’s budget came about because the province was later in passing through its budget, given a spring election.

The balanced budget for the 2017-2018 fiscal year sees $83,546,679 in expenses, with salaries (teachers, schools and board office staff) accounting for the greatest chunk.

In presenting the budget for approval at the board’s monthly meeting, Genna LeBlanc, the board’s coorindator of finances, says this year’s budget had not been as difficult or controversial in past years, given in the spring the board had already approved more teachers within its system.

The Tri- County Regional School Board approved an addition 16 full-time equivalent NSTU teaching positions for the 20172018 school year in May. Eight of these positions were a result of the Council to Improve Classroom Conditions, which had recommended hiring 139 teachers across the province for this school year. LeBlanc said the board was fortunate in that it did not have to make reductions in other areas to account for these additional positions.

The board has seen a steep decline in student enrollment, therefore a student enrollment supplement has also kicked in for the board.

The board has received $1.3 million in targeted funding from the province as well, for initiatives that are mandated by the province. Because this provincial funding is restricted to certain areas, the board was able to reallocate some of its funding elsewhere.

Deferred maintenance is still an issue for the school board, as priorities have caused it, over the years, to spend money in areas other then upkeep and maintenance of school buildings. But LeBlanc said with this budget they have been able to put some money back into this budget area.

This budget has been worked on since last spring. One item that came about after budget talks had started was the pre-primary initiative that the government put in place this fall, as it rolled out phase one of the program. Pre-primary had been an election pledge the Liberals had made.

There are six pre-primary sites in the Tri-County board. The overall cost of the program this year to the board is $580,000, which includes salaries, benefits, supplies, material and telecommunications.

Another area the board was also to increase was TAs (teacher assistants). There was an increase of 10 positions based on student needs within the board.

ANNUAL MEETING

Prior to the board’s monthly meeting it held its annual general meeting. At that meeting executive positions of the elected school board were voted on by members.

Michael Drew remains chair of the board, after he and Donna Tidd were nominated for the position.

There is a new vice-chair of the board after a larger number of votes were cast for board member Melanie Surette-Kenney over Tidd.

The position of third executive of the board went to Michael Alden Fells in a vote outcome over Dolores Atwood.

A new initiative to bolster school attendance will see 14 attendance support workers hired for pilot projects across the province.

The Council to Improve Classroom Conditions is providing $1.9 million during the next two years to fund the project.

Council member Jennifer Bruce, a teacher at E.B. Chandler Junior High in Amherst, announced the initiative on Nov. 8.

“This attendance support worker, their responsibility and part of their job is to go out and find the reason why those students are not there and help them get back into that seat,” Bruce said. She added they will be tasked with exploring why a student may be absent and will be able to work with the students and their families to “seek individualized solutions” for absenteeism.

“They have many responsibilities but the main responsibility that they have, first of all, is to find out the reason why the students are not there and then go back out into the community, find them wherever they are and to bring them back into school,” she said.

“In some cases, I believe it may be a simple solution why they’re not in school and in some cases, it’ll be more complex.”

As part of their mandate, the workers will go where the students are.

“They do have a budget for transportation to move around to find the students,” Bruce said.

While they are expected to locate the kids the intention is not to return to the old concept of truancy police.

“I believe that the goal perhaps is the same but I think the approach is much different,” she said. “There’s the idea of finding the students first. And then there’s also applying an individualized solution – what that