Jackson Lafferty

Mahsi, Madam Speaker. I have already made a commitment in the House that I will be meeting with the board of governors’ chair and also the president, both of them together, to highlight the Member’s concern that the board of governors should be meeting with the students.

I don’t want to be in a position to dictate to the board of governors or the district education councils or authorities to tell them what to do. We have to work hand in hand. We have to work closely together between the departments and agencies, so we continue to strengthen the relationship we have with the agencies and DEAs...

Those are targeted discussions that we are currently having with the various agencies, as I highlighted earlier, to deal with the measures in the communities, especially with the Hamlet of Aklavik. Recommendations and solutions will be brought to the Hamlet of Aklavik and we’ll work on those solutions. Mahsi, Madam Speaker.

Mahsi, Madam Speaker. I’d like to recognize all the Pages that are here with us today, all this week, for all the hard work that they’re doing, but more specifically from the Monfwi riding. I’d like to recognize Shaylynn Mantla that’s here with us, and also Noelene Nitsiza that’s here with us. They both came from Chief Jimmy Bruneau School in Behchoko. I’d just like to say thank you for your hard work. Mahsi.

Mr. Speaker, when we first introduced that the PTR be adjusted, the formula, to the superintendents, it came out with various numbers for the school boards during the three-year phases. The school boards, the superintendents did come back and recommended that we seriously consider having a PTR discussion pertaining to kindergarten through Grade 12, so those are the discussions that we’ve had with them, taking those into consideration, to make some make some modifications to the actual numbers from the original intent to what we have with the numbers now. So I made some changes over time. So...

Throughout the Early Childhood Development Framework there has been a lot of engagement and the forum that we held in Yellowknife and surrounding communities. The superintendents have been involved, during the transition period of the discussion, about what kind of initiative should be undertaken by the department. One of them was junior kindergarten, the discussions that we’ve been having, and I presented to the board chairs of what our approach would be, part of the Early Childhood Development Framework, working along with Health and Social Services. The superintendents have been involved...

We have to keep in mind that we’re rolling out the junior kindergarten for all the children in the Northwest Territories. We talk about the larger centres and the smaller centres. We’re here for the Northwest Territories, so we are providing those benefits to those communities and, more specifically, those 10 communities that do not have licenced child care programming, daycare programming, and the preschools and so forth. At the end of the day, we’re serving the children of the Northwest Territories and it will benefit the whole Northwest Territories.

Mr. Speaker, there has been preliminary discussion with the child care operators when we started talking about the early childhood development, the overall framework and the action plan. Part of that was introducing the junior kindergarten. All regions have early childhood regional consultants that are available to answer any questions or ideas that they may have or any assistance for these operators.

Under the Early Childhood Development Action Plan, my department has come out with having a comprehensive communication dialogue and also a plan. Within the plan, we’re developing a toll-free...

Mr. Speaker, my department, as I have stated, is developing an action plan to help support licenced programs that may be affected during the transition of bringing the junior kindergarten into our school system. Both Education, Culture and Employment early childhood consultants and also headquarters staff will be working very closely with all the daycare operators throughout the Northwest Territories and during the introduction of junior kindergarten will provide options for parents, and in particular for our communities that do not have licenced child care programming. Those are just some of...

Mr. Speaker, this continues to be a very exciting time for education in not only the North but the entire country. Through our Education Renewal and Innovation work, we are recognizing how people learn, what supports are needed to help them learn and how we can improve education for all students.

We developed the Education Renewal and Innovation (ERI) Initiative to make that improvement happen. Our newly released framework, Directions for Change, highlights the potential initiatives we know can make a difference in the lives of our students. A world leader on self-regulation, Dr. Stuart Shanker...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following document, titled “Education Renewal and Innovation Engagement Update 2014.” Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.