‘ Inner city’ schools may see services cut back

Two Vancouver schools may lose their inner city school designation — which gives them additional staffing, a breakfast and lunch program and afterschool programming — as the Vancouver school board wrestles with how to best provide services to schools with the greatest concentration of students living in poverty.

Mount Pleasant elementary and General Brock elementary will no longer receive additional resources from the Vancouver School District’s Inner City Program if the board approves of a proposed plan to move to a three- tier system and eliminate two of the schools from the program.

A shift in demographics means schools once considered in need of support are no longer in as much need, said Vancouver school board chairwoman Patti Bacchus.

“You don’t want to be taking away from one to give to another and it’s an awful decision to make but you have to be evidence- based,” she said.

“I know we’ll hear back that there is still great needs at these schools but the reality is we have to be accountable for our choices on how we spend our money.”

Bacchus said the board is trying to put its limited resources toward schools with the greatest need. She said General Brock, for example, used to have social housing nearby at Little Mountain but that is now gone and the need is no longer as great.

Bacchus said research has shown that students facing poverty issues tend to have better outcomes if they are in schools with a demographic not heavily impacted by poverty.

“Research shows that their odds are better if they are surrounded by hope and optimism,” she said. “They have better resiliency.”

She said it is the schools where poverty is inter- generational and there is an entrenched feeling of hopelessness where the resources are most needed.

Mount Pleasant elementary PAC member Kristina Welton-Davis said they are against the change and believe approximately 30 per cent of the 200 students attending still require support that the inner city designation provides.

She said there are about 30 families who need the additional food program, such as the weekend Blessings in a Backpack and the yearly Christmas hampers. Welton-Davis said it’s not fair to take away supports the school has been accessing for years, such as yearly Science World passes for those students attending the Super Science Club after- school program.

“Yes, there are some families in $ 600,000- to $ 1- million homes who are accessing ( the additional resources) as well but they are taking away something from the kids that need it,” she said.

The Inner City Program started 25 years ago. Under the new tiered program, the schools most in need ( Tier 1) would continue to have access to additional staff, counselling, a breakfast and lunch program, junior kindergarten and out- ofschool programming.

Schools in the second tier would receive the same benefits, except for a junior kindergarten and extra special education assistants.

And schools in the third tier would have access to the same benefits, except the food programs — which would be available on an as- needed basis — which means only students identified as needing it would be given paper bag lunches instead of providing a schoolwide hot lunch program for everyone.

The six elementary schools that would be in Tier 1 include Sir William MacDonald, Lord Strathcona, Grandview, Admiral Seymour, Britannia Community and Thunderbird.

An interim report prepared for the board in January stated there is a greater likelihood of creating equity among the schools by focusing more resources on schools that are clearly in the highest needs category, and this would be in keeping with the original vision of the Inner City Program.

“There has been a dilution of supports over the years and it has been felt most intensely in the six schools in communities where there is the most concentrated poverty. These schools are all located near Social Housing and thus will likely not change their demographics in the next five years,” reads the report.