Montreal, September 28, 2015 – The Quebec English School Boards Association is very pleased with the change in position on school board structures made by Premier Couillard over the weekend during the PLQ Forum on Education in the 21st Century.
“QESBA was gratified that not only has the Premier taken school board structures off the agenda, but that he went on to say that our English education network is an example that should be followed and respected,” said QESBA President David D’Aoust.
“It is time for our network to sit with Premier Couillard and present him with our vision of the future of education,” concluded D’Aoust.
QESBA has three key areas that we have shown will benefit our network but more importantly our students:
- QESBA is ready to discuss merging certain services offered by school boards into regional models to maximize cost savings that will ultimately benefit the classroom.
- Decentralization is common practice in the English system. QESBA would like to discuss offering more pedagogical freedom to Principals and Teachers who are directly accountable to students.
- School board democracy, with elections by universal suffrage, is a fundamental principle for the English-speaking community in Quebec. QESBA is very open to discussing more parent commissioners at the council level with the right to vote – we have in fact been lobbying that same point since 1998. We would also like to see discussions more specifically, towards on-line voting and the feasibility of twinning school board elections with municipal.
QESBA would like to thank the Premier for his openness over the weekend and we are counting on him to work with our community to move education forward.
QESBA is the voice of English public education in Québec representing some 100,000 students.