New BCCPAC Resolution on Board Budget Planning Process

This resolution will be voted on at the upcoming BCCPAC AGM.

http://www.bccpac.bc.ca/news-blog/resolution-seeks-greater-clarity-about-school-board-budgets

Be it resolved that

BCCPAC call on the BC School Trustees’ Association, the BC Association of School Business Officials and the Ministry of Education to, in conjunction with BCCPAC, develop and implement standardized processes to improve the transparency and clarity of preliminary budget information to support parent consultation during the district budget process.

Proposer’s Position Statement Supporting the Resolution.

Parents, PACs and DPACs, often participate in the annual district preliminary budget process. Frequently the information provided by the boards to aid in the consultation is complex, incomplete and lacking in options. The consultation process is reduced to pleas to keep certain programs or measures and offer little or no choice to parents as to what measures they prefer or other programs they may no longer want. The information provided is not in a standard format, nor directly comparable between districts or sometimes even with prior years in the same district. Parents are often provided with the proposed budget but days before the final budget decisions must be made again negating the possibility of meaningful feedback.

This makes it more difficult for parents to provide important feedback to boards regarding which choices for the final budget they prefer. This resolution is designed to provide parents with accurate information, choice and the time for careful consideration of the alternatives. This will lead to boards making better decisions about what parents want in their children’s schools and a better education system.

The provided information should be:

• Complete
• Easy to understand
• In a standard and comparable format for all districts
• Include a list of all budgetary items and amounts that are not mandated by the Ministry of Education
• Provide significant choice in measures that will increase or decrease the size of the district budget.
• Provided to parents before February 28th of each year.