Anglophone district education councils (DECs) are considering legal action against proposed changes by the government to remove their decision-making authority.
The Anglophone East DEC is in discussions with other councils across the province.
DEC member Kristin Cavoukian says they see this as an attack on democracy, “We are members of the communities that we represent. We are elected by our local communities, and we represent the best interests of our schools and our communities. So, trying to remove power from the DEC is removing power from communities from parents, from students, from staff, from principals and from our districts.”
The provincial government says under a new Education Act in the anglophone sector, DECs will change from a decision-making body to an advisory body. Instead of reporting to the Council, Superintendents will report directly to the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. Proposed changes would take effect on July 1.
Cavoukian says taking away power from the Councils, means the government can attack any number of things, “They could start closing local schools because it makes more financial sense. DECs actually fight to keep schools open. So, without the DEC acting as a public opposition, the government would have a much freer hand in ramming through policies. The main authority that DEC’s had is that we get to hire and monitor Superintendents in our District and we get some measure of control over the operations of the district. We get to hold the District and the Superintendent accountable. Without us in the way, the government could fire Superintendents and appoint partisan hacks. They could make any changes they wanted.”
She expects a decision on whether or not they’ll move forward with legal action will be made soon, “There’s no time to delay at this point. We need to make sure that our voices are heard loud and clear in opposing what this government is doing. Time is of the essence. This government seems intent on ramming through numerous terrible ideas and we need to make sure that our DECs are there to oppose that sort of change. I think it’s high time that Higgs and Hogan left kids in the anglophone system alone and picked on someone their own size.”
In the Francophone sector, district education councils will retain their existing authorities as per Section 23 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which grants the Francophone community the right of management and control as it relates to educational governance.
