Editorial
Education transparency benefits everyone
The provincial government has announced that information about Alberta schools, such as enrolment trends, will now be made more readily available to parents and other members of the general public.
By making the information more easily accessible, the government says it hopes stakeholders will now have a better picture of where tax dollars are being spent and how students are benefiting from that public financial contribution.
As one of the key components of every community in West Central Alberta, the health and welfare of schools is obviously of interest to most residents. And as such, anything that makes the education system more transparent benefits the community at large, as well as students and teachers.
“Clear, simple information helps parents understand and make informed decisions about the educational opportunities available in their local communities,” said Education Minister Thomas Lukaszuk.
“School boards have long been reporting this information to the ministry. It's time to share that information with parents so they can see how jurisdictions are doing and how much funding they received as part of Budget 2012.”
The education data is being provided through information sheets that are being posted on a new website: education.alberta.ca/parents/educationsys.aspx.
As well as enrolment trends for each jurisdiction, the sheets will also provide information on such things as student demographics, capital planning announcements and recent projects, the number of school and teaching staff in each division, operating budgets and accumulated surpluses.
The sheets also include data on school jurisdiction accountability, including high school completion rates, performance on provincial assessment programs, and parental involvement.
While giving parents and other stakeholders more and better access to school information is a great way to increase public awareness of the workings of the education system, educators and trustees must also continue to be given the latitude to run the schools as they see fit.
Principals and their staff members are specially trained to run schools in a professional and structured manner. With that in mind, parents will hopefully not use the new information being made available by Alberta Education to start micro-managing their kids' education.
For example, it would probably not benefit anyone for parents to start inundating school principals with calls on exactly how surpluses should be spent.
Keeping a good eye on how things are going – and raising concerns if necessary – is a great way for parents and others to be involved in the education system. If it works as intended, this increased transparency will make that job easier for everyone.
At the same time, educators are hired to teach students and trustees are elected to oversee that education system – and that hopefully won't change despite this new transparency.
