By Greg Nikkel
The board of trustees for the Holy Family Roman Catholic Separate School Division expressed many frustrations and concerns about the coming changes for school boards as the Ministry of Education works to change how school boards operate.
Board chair Bruno Tuchscherer noted he had to be careful what he said in public, because all trustees and board chairs had to sign an agreement with the Ministry about what is and what is not released publicly about the process. The government passed the amended Education Act, but the real changes won’t be known until the regulations for the Act are determined and released.
Tuchscherer and some trustees expressed some misgivings and fears due to the lack of communications from the Ministry, and frustration that they don’t really have any idea what is going on.
“The Ministry wants to set up a committee with the minister and board chairs, who would get information and discuss the whole situation,” said Tuchscherer. “There doesn’t seem to be much communication between the ministry and us at this point. We are supposed to be kept in the loop for more discussions, but these meetings have been going on for two or three weeks and we’re not being told anything.”
Education director Gwen Keith noted the ministry has set up four main committees to overhaul how education is set up and operated in Saskatchewan, and all participants have had to keep a high level of confidentiality during the discussions.
She pointed out that the minutes of the meetings so far are “meaningless”, because they are so generic and have no details whatsoever about what is being decided.
“Nobody has any idea what is going on,” agreed Tuchscherer, noting at least one of the committees, reviewing the procedures on how schools are closed, said they are supposed to come up with a direction by the end of May.
“I think the government is trying to put something through, but is putting a target on your foreheads for whatever is coming out of this,” said trustee Rocky Sidloski, adding that the ministry is going to claim that the boards were fully involved in the process when in fact they are being kept in the dark about everything.
Tuchscherer noted that all of the board chairs found out after the fact that they were supposed to have signed a protocol document before they would be provided any details, and he pointed out that all of the chairs indicated they did not know this.
“Decisions are happening without much input from anybody,” he added.
The committees basically have May and June to have their discussions, said Tuchscherer, then the ministry will be making the decisions in July and August, “and we’re going to hear about it by the fall.”
Sidloski said in his view, “the decisions are made already and this is just lip service. When the ministry says everybody was involved, there should be some lash back. I don’t want the public to put the blame back on us as boards or chairs.”
