INNISFAIL - Chinook’s Edge School Division (CESD) trustees have instructed administration to formulate an updated or new administrative procedure governing guest speakers at the classroom and school level.
Superintendent Kurt Sacher is overseeing the project, which he says will ensure procedure supports curriculum and division goals while also considering communications with families when guest speakers are proposed.
The 11,000-student CESD is headquartered in Innisfail. Trustees discussed the matter at a recent regularly scheduled board meeting.
“The intent of it is to make sure that our processes are refined and ready to go,” Sacher told the Albertan. “The world around us is changing to where there may be a little more emotion out there. What’s a controversial speaker in one community may not be in another community.
“Our administrators are consummate professionals who always check the background of a speaker, checking that their materials are appropriate. They are always trying to remember that if you are presenting one side of, say, a controversial topic, that they are also exposing students to the other side of the coin and at the same time being respectful.”
The updated or new procedure will also deal with parental notification, he said.
“The board wants to make sure we have plans around informing parents, particularly if it is something we want to give them advanced awareness of,” he said.
“If they are concerned about their child attending a controversial speaker, they have an opportunity to express that concern and look at other options with the school.”
Asked if a new or updated procedure would include a list of speaker topics that would not be permitted, he said, “No, we are not getting into that. This is about making sure that we’ve got good due diligence in our processes prior to bringing a speaker in so nobody is surprised, and it is purposeful and it’s being done carefully but for a really legitimate need in the classroom or in the school.”
The project has not been prompted by an event or proposed speaker, he said.
The division’s existing AP 2 - 04 administrative procedure states the “division acknowledges the importance of informing parents of the curriculum content for the educational program in which their child is enrolled (including) subject-matter and student outcomes that deals primarily and explicitly with religion, human sexuality and sexual orientation.”
The procedure does not refer to guest speakers.
“We are considering creating a whole new administrative procedure because when it comes to speakers it is fairly different,” Sacher said. “We will either add language to AP 2 - 04 or we will create a new one.”
The new or updated procedure will need to align with curriculum and goals of the jurisdiction and “that we are communicating that clearly to the public, to the parents,” he said.
In a release issued following the recent CESD board meeting, the division said the board “recognizes that guest speakers can add richness to learning opportunities for students in schools. Also, the board recognizes there are topics that can be sensitive from the perspective of some students.”
The new or updated procedure should be ready within the next month or so, he said.
