Despite increases in education funding announced in the 2011 provincial budget, the Northern Lights School Division is facing nearly $2 million in cutbacks for the upcoming school year if they want to maintain their operating surplus, division administration told school board trustees at last week’s school board meeting held in Lac La Biche.
Using all of the $2.5 million surplus to compensate for a funding shortfall would result in the division being left cashless, and forced to operate on a line of credit, NLSD secretary/treasurer Beverley Topylki told trustees.
The division will be receiving an increase of $1.4 million in base funding, but that amount is offset by various program cuts and a 4.4 per cent increase in salaries that will leave the division $1.9 million in the red, based on last year’s enrolment numbers.
Funding for base instruction and class sizes for Kindergarten and Grades 1 to 3 has increased by 4.4 per cent, and high school funding also increased by 4.4 per cent. As of September 2011, Grade 4 to 6 class size funding, enrolment growth funding and enrolment decline funding will all be cut. The Alberta Initiative for School Improvement grant was also cut by 50 per cent, as was stabilization funding.
If NLSD continues on the same course, without adjusting spending, superintendent Roger Nippard said they will have to pay for necessities with borrowed money.
“We will be operating on a line of credit,” he said, adding that maintaining an operating surplus would be one way to avoid the issue.
But he stressed the situation wasn’t dire, and that with a $72 million budget, $2 million was an acceptable amount to trim. “The sky isn’t falling,” he told trustees.
Lac La Biche trustee Danny Smaiel noted that things could look brighter if enrolment numbers go up, adding he didn’t want to make any knee-jerk reactions to the provincial budget decisions. One option, he suggested, could be to go back to the province and tell politicians that the budgeted amount isn’t enough.
“We may need to go back to Alberta Education and say this is not going to suffice,” he said.
While there will likely need to be cuts, both school board employees and trustees maintained that everything possible would be done to protect students and teachers from the budget cuts.
“We’re going to minimize the impact on children,” said Smaiel.
The school board received the financial summary as they prepare to discuss the upcoming school year budget, and although aware of the upcoming cuts that may need to be made, trustees and school division officials are still unsure of what will need to be cut from the budget.