Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in fact there was a briefing done, and I think the Member was there, on the Student Financial Assistance issue. A lot of work has been done. The work that I am attempting to move forward is in no way preliminary. It is ready to be taken forward for a decision as I indicated to the Members when I did the briefing. The plan is, since there are legislative changes required to address the specific funding issues and deal with the issues of remissibility and the concerns of the aboriginal students, I would anticipate to be able to bring something forward in, hopefully, our next sitting for consideration. That, I am confident, while it may not please everybody, that it will address the issues that the Member raised. As well, it will also make more money available to students within existing budget by making some other changes in regard to the requirements to pass and to have to pay back if you drop out and those kind of issues. I would hope to be able to move forward on this so that we are ready for the next session. Thank you.

Mr. Ootes.

Thank you. I made reference earlier to the fact that some individuals are taxed on monies they receive and others are not. My first question is, I understand the Minister has consulted and discussed this matter with the Metis Nation, but I noted that the South Slave Metis are contemplating suing, I believe, the federal government to resolve this issue. Is the Minister doing further consulting work on this and checking with various groups on this matter?

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Dene, the Metis and the Inuvialuit have been consulted. The issue with the South Slave Metis is that they have very legitimate concerns about the current system. What I intend to bring forward as a proposal will address that, I believe, and the issue right now is that the federal government taxes the grants for Metis, Inuvialuit, because they are not given the same consideration as treaty people and we have come up with an option that addresses that at our end and that will, I think, meet the concern of the federal government and avoid taxation in the future. So there has been a lot of work done on this. This has been in the works for two years or so. It is just an issue of moving it forward to the final political decision making and approval so we can implement it. If we can get it approved, we

would hope they would be ready for business in terms of the new financing arrangements by the 2000 school year.

General comments. Mr. Ootes.

The 2000 school year being this coming fall, is that what you mean, or the following year, the fall of 2000? Okay, so we are about a year and a half away as a possible solution to this, is that correct?

Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Member is correct that there is not time from a logistical and implementation point of view to be up and running for the coming school year in September, so that, yes, we would be anticipating having everything in place, information and advertising done and students and all potential students being notified and all the systems in place for the fall of 2000.

General comments. Mr. Ootes.

Could the Minister tell us if any tracking has been done on the SFA Program and if you have done such tracking what kind of success rate is there for students?

Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Member raises a good point. We track enrolments, we track our expenditures, but we do not track in any comprehensive ongoing way at this point the graduation rates or indicators of success. It has been pointed out as a deficiency in the Student Financial Assistance system and it is one that we are taking steps to address so that, in fact, we can speak specifically to how the money is being spent and is it in fact achieving the goals that we are putting in place through this program to achieve. So that is a good point. We do it on a spot basis, but we intend to come up with a thorough ongoing way to do this so we can in fact come to this House and answer that very question.

General comments. Mr. Ootes.

Thank you. I understand that the revised program does have certain criteria in it, but there is a need for a certain success factor along the way in order for a student to continue to receive funding. Can the Minister maybe explain that a little further for us? For example, if a student drops out part way through the year, but restarts the following semester, what happens? Is the funding continued then, or what is the process?

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Those are some of the issues that we are waiting to put in final place, but the intent is to have a requirement to show success that if a student drops out or fails, that there is going to be a payback qualification where we will be able to recover the cost of the Student Financial Assistance and it is through that particular process that we intend to finance the higher funding for tuition and books and travel. We are confident that we can, through making these changes, increase the levels of Student Financial Assistance that are currently available to students. I addressed the issue of the Metis and Inuvialuit students in terms of admissibility within the existing budget. Thank you.

Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would just like to switch to a different topic and Mr. Henry referred to it earlier and that is the social passing program that we have. The Minister had referenced the fact that neither system seems to have sort of, what would we call it, great attractions to it. If we have social passing, there is some detractions to that, but if we do the failure program long away there are some detractions to that. I wonder if the Minister could tell me if we are looking at perhaps a compromised system or a different system to address this issue? I think there are criticisms of the social passing system, but, as the Minister pointed out, there are some detractions to the other system that used to be in place as well. Are we looking at and can we look at different possibilities in our school system?

Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, to my mind, and I think based on at least this article I have read, that the issue of social passing, as well as the issue of holding students back, neither are perceived to be very adequate or effective. What we are looking at is the issue of early remediation, working from a very early age through things like the Healthy Children Initiative, like promoting greater parental involvement, working with the families and the schools, trying to come up with better training and support for teachers to deal with children at the very early ages from K to 3 or 4. Social passing is still there, but if we want to do truly, significant and effective changes, we have to look at that approach dealing very early with the family and the children and then making sure we are at the front end, from K to 3 or 4 that we have a strong system in place to make sure the children get the sound basics or get up and running so that they can progress on to the higher grades. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. General comments. Mr. Rabesca.