Thank you, Mr. Henry. I did not follow your calculations either how you arrived at 105 percent, but I will let the Minister try and figure that one out. Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. What the 105 percent is arrived at is that 75 percent funding for K to 9, the 25 percent is raised locally through education taxes, mill rate which is a trade-off for the greater autonomy and decision making. The city I understand, or the two school districts, have chosen to raise more than the 25 percent so that when you combine all the figures together they are raising closer to 30 percent. So it comes to about 105 percent. The government is throwing in 100 percent 10 to 12, 75 percent K to 9. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Henry.

Thank you, Mr. Henry. Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. The first issue in regard to incentive for other communities to take on the autonomy that Yellowknife wanted, the Member is right. No other community in the North has the size or the tax base to be able to take on that kind of role. I do not anticipate it happening in any other jurisdiction outside of Yellowknife. The issue that the Member raises, we touched on briefly as well yesterday. That is Yellowknife being a magnet community. The funding, in fact, formulas do not recognize that. What is now recognized are magnet facilities. There are people and students coming in and out of town. It is an issue. Mr. Cleveland indicates that we are aware of that. It is something that as we look at the other issue of special needs we are going to be trying to address. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. I have Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Yesterday I had an opportunity to say a few words about the potential difficulty of attracting teachers to the Northwest Territories in the future, not because of where we are at, but because of competition that we potentially face by other jurisdictions, not just in Canada but internationally it appears. I am wondering if because of what I said yesterday, I know the Minister, I believe, talked about the turnover possibly being down according to their figures. Are the figures they have given me their indicators to date or is that the indicator for next year, for this coming fall? It is of concern because we have to solidify our teachers' retention rate here in the territories.

As I said, it is an international problem and several teachers that I know have in one case, one has been attracted to New Zealand and this was mid-term. In another case it is a couple and they are planning to go back to the far east. They have taught there before. There are some reasons why they are interested. They are making less money there, but just as a side note here I would like to make a comment on it because I think this is important as well. They are going there because they feel the discipline in the schools is much better there than it is in our circumstance. It is not money reasons why they are going there. It is strictly because they get more respect from the students. More respect from the parents.

Now, I am not saying that all students and all parents are disrespectful to teachers, but in their particular case it is an element of concern. A while ago I heard a comment on the radio from a person in Saskatchewan or Manitoba, I believe, a teacher commenting as well about the problem of discipline within classes and that it is leading to a problem for teachers. I guess I am addressing two questions here in one. First if I can get back to my latter comments. If I can ask the question of, are the statistics the Minister used yesterday, do they refer to the upcoming year starting this fall, is that the projection? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Yes, they do. The statistics are based on information that was supplied by the divisional education councils as of the week of May 3 to 7, 1999. What happens is that teachers have to submit their resignation by April 30, which has come and gone and we have collated the numbers since then. Yes, the numbers that I gave you yesterday are accurate unless there are unforeseen resignations which would be with prejudice and would be outside the normal process. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Despite what the statistics may be, we will have a percentage of turnover and will, no doubt, face competition to get replacements. Could the Minister tell me, do they have any concerns in that area about how to attract the turnover numbers that we have to replace for teachers?

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Miltenberger.

Yes, Madam Chairperson, we are concerned. We are aware, as the Member indicated, of the increasing scarcity of teachers available for hire in competition for their services. We are, as I indicated earlier on, myself and the other Ministers in the social envelope are looking at some of the side issues like housing and such in the small communities for essential services like teachers and nurses. We are in the midst of starting the collective bargaining process, which will, I am sure, bring a lot of concerns to the table. The turnover this year is 12 percent down from last year. Hopefully, it is a trend that will continue, but it is an issue that we are monitoring so that we can hopefully, avoid the same situation that we are in with nurses where we have to basically go into crisis mode to make sure we have enough nurses. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Ootes.

It really leads me to the question and I guess we could discuss forever and a day, how we are going to attract teachers. In the end it really boils down to teacher satisfaction. I alluded to that with my previous comments about teachers, no doubt, are becoming a little more frustrated in the classroom with the methodology of discipline and how they maintain discipline and the treatment they receive within the classroom. I had, last fall I believe, asked some questions in regard to a policy on violence in the classroom and the Minister had stated that, yes, there is a policy on violence, but the Minister, I believe, said it was left up to the boards. I wonder if the Minister can tell me if that subject has been further addressed because, to leave it up to the boards, as I stated last fall or spring, I do not think that you

can just leave that to the boards. I think there needs to be a directive to state you must have a policy on violence in the classroom and how you address that. There should be certain criteria associated with that. The object, of course, here is to provide some comfort for those who are in the teaching profession that we care about them and that there are systems in place for some protection for them. As I say, there are not perhaps tremendous widespread incidents of violence in the schools, but it does occur.

Also, I think we need to ensure the respect for teachers on the part of all students. I am sure there are a lot of students who have respect for their teachers, probably the majority, but there are those who do not. We have to ensure our system provides a mechanism to ensure that teachers are respected. I just made reference to two cases where people are leaving because they feel that in other jurisdictions they are much more respected, they have much more authority. Can the Minister tell me what the department's position is on the policy on violence in schools.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Madam Chairperson, the issue that the Member raises initially, the one of respect for the teachers by parents and students, I think is a very critical issue. It is not a money issue. It ties into the role of the family, the support at home, how close the students and parents work with the schools and the need for communities, schools, families, and DEAs to support and nurture that close working relationship to set the values and the standards of what is acceptable and what is not. It is a critical issue for a whole host of reasons, but one of the big ones is we want to have schools that are safe places, that are non-violent places of learning. The government has heard the concern.

They have funded and have now provided training for certification in crisis prevention in the schools. As of October, 1998, there was a course held in Yellowknife of which there were 28 people certified to be able to go back to their communities to start working with the students, staff, and volunteers to ensure that the schools are safe.

As well, there is work being done with the DEAs and DECs to develop student support plans that address that issue. I am also going to be meeting with the board chairs on the week of the 25th and I will be adding that to the list of issues that I would like to touch on with the various divisional boards. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. General comments. Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Madam Chairperson, one of the first things I did as Minister when we received the committee report was pull out all the recommendations that were made to ensure that I could talk to the department about them. This issue of the suggestion for testing is being actively investigated. We have been looking at jurisdictions in terms of cost. One of the quotes that we have, for example, to develop our own grade 12 diploma exams, just initial discussion, is about $4.5 million. We want to do a little more homework on this. Things have been relatively hectic, but we are following up to see in fact what is doable, what the costs are and what the benefits would be. We will be sharing that information once we have it compiled. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Erasmus.