We will do that after a brief break. Thank you.

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Okay. I'd like to call Committee of the Whole back to order. We are, today, dealing with Bill 4, An Act to Amend the Education Act. At this time, I'd like to ask Mr. Dent if he has opening comments related to the bill. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes. I'd like to thank the committee for this opportunity to discuss Bill 4, An Act to Amend the Education Act.

The key objective of the amendment to the act is to allow division education councils to offer full-day kindergarten programs. The Education Act currently specifies a maximum allowable number of hours of kindergarten instruction equivalent to a half-day program. The changes proposed to the act specify a minimum number of hours, thereby mandating half-day programs while allowing education authorities the option of full-day programs or both half and full-day programs.

Over the past few years some education authorities have argued that children entering the school system require additional preparation prior to their enrolment in Grade 1. Research supporting full-day kindergarten programs shows that, if providing developmentally appropriate learning activities, they can contribute to improved academic skills in the primary grades and to general school readiness.

Divisional education councils, or DECs, and district education authorities, or DEAs, would like to implement full-day kindergarten programs. In fact, some districts have been offering full-day options for five-year-olds. These additional half-day programs are early childhood development programs and not regulated under the Education Act. The proposed legislation will ensure that programs for five-year-olds in the school system are comprehensive and cohesive.

To provide guidance to DECs and DEAs, the Department of Education, Culture and Employment is in the process of developing curriculum guidelines for school programming for five-year-olds that extends beyond the current half-day kindergarten program.

In advance of development of the legislative amendment to change the Education Act, consultation was undertaken with the chairs of the district education councils, district education authorities and the Commission Scolaire Francophone de Division. The education authorities unanimously support the concept of removing the current limitations on the kindergarten program.

It is important to note that education authorities are not currently funded for full-day kindergarten. We have noted that the Standing Committee on Social Programs recommended that funding be provided to ensure the ability of education authorities to offer full-day kindergarten should the bill be approved. This recommendation is being considered as part of the current business planning process. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Now I will ask the Member for Range Lake, Ms. Sandy Lee, chair of the Social Programs committee, to present the committee's comments on the review of Bill 4.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Standing Committee on Social Programs conducted public hearings on Bill 4, An Act to Amend the Education Act, in the communities of Fort Smith, Fort Resolution, and Hay River, during the week of June 22 to 28, 2005, and in Yellowknife on June 20, 2005, and October 11, 2005.

Bill 4 will have the effect of changing the number of hours allowed for kindergarten instruction from a maximum amount based on a half-day program, to a minimum amount, again based on a half-day program. This will have the intended effect of allowing full-day kindergarten programs to continue in the Northwest Territories, and will legitimize the current practices of many school boards. Many boards have chosen to use their surpluses and discretionary funding to deliver full-day kindergarten programs, and have shown improved results in testing at the Grade 3 level for those children who attended a full-time or full-day structured kindergarten program. There are many studies that show improved early childhood education programs help children to succeed in school. We need to give our children every advantage.

It is important to note that this bill will not require school boards to deliver full-day kindergarten programs nor require parents to enrol their children in full-day programs. Indeed, parents, under the Education Act, are not even required to send their children to school until they turn six

years old. This bill will allow the government to fund full-day kindergarten programs. The way the Education Act is currently written, the department can only fund half-day kindergarten programs, and this bill can be considered to be establishing the legislative base that will allow the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment the ability to establish funding in a future budget.

The concerns that we heard from presenters centred on the fact that this legislation will not do much good if there is no money for the school boards to implement a full-day program and that if appropriate programming was not developed to fill a full-day of kindergarten it was, essentially, a babysitting service for five-year-olds. The committee is aware that the department is funded for, and is currently developing, what we hope is quality programming for a full-day kindergarten program.

The Standing Committee on Social Programs would like to thank the Minister and his department for introducing this amendment. It is a necessary step in establishing funded full-day kindergarten programs in the Northwest Territories. Committee members will be pursuing the necessary funding through the business plan and main estimate process, and will be supporting the Minister in securing this funding for the 2006-2007 school year.

This concludes the committee's general comments on Bill 4. Individual Members may have questions or comments as we proceed. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. At this time, I'd like to ask Mr. Dent if he would like to bring witnesses into the chamber.

Yes, please, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Is the committee agreed?

Agreed. Thank you. Then I will ask the Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms to escort the witnesses to the witness table.

Mr. Dent, could you please introduce your witnesses for the record?

Thank you, Madam Chair. On my left I have Mr. Mark Aitken, who is the director of the legislation division for the Department of Justice; and, Mr. Mark Cleveland on my right, who is the deputy minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Members, general comments on Bill 4, An Act to Amend the Education Act. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Obviously, I support the amendment, and I do thank the Minister for making this an action item. We're not being exactly proactive in this area; we're sort of catching up to what school boards have been doing, because we know that there are many school boards in the North who have already been providing full-time kindergarten, and now we're just saying that it's okay for you to have at least minimum and maximum half-day programs. We're not even really fully legitimizing full-day kindergarten programs.

I support this amendment, but this got me thinking about how it was possible that, for so many years, school boards have been able to fund full-time kindergarten, and does the department know what kind of effect that has on the school budget and the money that we gave the school boards to do other things? I guess the PTR ratio, two or three years ago, was 18 to one. We have made efforts to reduce them to, I don't know what it is now, less than 16 to one, and here we are, in this Assembly, doing what we can to reduce the PTR ratio so that there can be more money for students in the school system. It's good that they have the choice to do this, but it's a balancing act. How much leeway are they supposed to have, and how can we know, then, that what we are doing here is translating into classrooms? If the school boards decide that they're going to fund full-time kindergarten when they weren't funded for it, then we have to ask where they were taking the money from. While I'm sure the educators know, they have to make the decisions on where and what, but how much knowledge do we have, and how much do we have a say on how our public money that we vote here is being spent?

I support this legislation, because I think kindergarten education is very important because most parents now work. Most parents are not able or willing to provide the kind of pre-school education and support to the kids that maximize learning potential and activities for the kids for many, many different reasons. It is beneficial to have a structured kindergarten program for the kids. But we're not making this uniform across the board. There will be lots of schools around the North who are not able to do this, whether it's because they don't have money from within the funding, or because they can't get teachers, or they don't have a classroom, or their school boards decide that this is not the priority of the board.

So I am concerned about the fact that we may have a sort of patchwork kindergarten programming, and the extent and quality of pre-school education available to our kids. So let me just say again, I support the bill and what it purports to do, but I do want to discuss with the Minister, in general, about those two points. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. General comments. Did you have a question? Was there a question there, Ms. Lee, for the Minister?

I do want to get the Minister's responses to my two points. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. It sounded more like a comment than a question. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The approach to delivering education in the Northwest Territories, now, is one that is substantially decentralized. We have elected bodies in communities that get to make decisions that are relevant to that community in terms of how the programming is offered. So, for instance, the culture and language programming is not the same in any two communities. It's substantially different. The Tlicho region's approach to cultural inclusion will be different than that which is found in the Gwich'in region, perhaps. We don't stipulate that schools have to follow or deliver exactly the same programs in the same ways. That's one of the beauties in the system, in that it can recognize local priorities and bring those into the schools. So there is a considerable amount of flexibility in the funding.

Where has the funding been coming for the programming that has been provided? In some cases, that has been through external sources. DEAs will have applied for, and received, funding through the Healthy Children's Initiative, for developmental programs, as they have pitched as fitting into the early childhood programs. There will be some that have said that this important enough, and we are satisfied that we are seeing enough of a difference in Grade 3, that if it means larger class sizes for the other grades, then that's what we'll do.

So the approach hasn't been a cookie cutter one. Where the monies have been coming from, has been varied across the Territories. Does this mean that we might have a bit of a patchwork approach? Yes, that is entirely possible, because it will be up to the elected people in each community to determine what their priorities are and where they fit. My goal is to make sure that if a community or a school is offering a full-day program, that we are able to provide them with the funding for full-day programming. But I don't think we're going to necessarily offer the funding if the program isn't offered for a full day.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Ms. Lee.

Why is it that when we know that schools have been funding full-time kindergarten when they were not budgeted for it, and obviously taking money from somewhere else because they have decided to do so, now we are saying that we want to catch up to that, because we support full-time kindergarten? Why is it that we're not saying you could have full-time kindergarten at a maximum, or half-time kindergarten at a minimum, and then fund accordingly? Why are we just going half way?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm not sure that...I think we're going half way. I'm saying that if the school is offering a full-day kindergarten program, based on our curriculum, it is my goal to make sure that we're able to offer the funding to support that programming. We don't provide the budget right now. We don't say to a school, you have to have a librarian; we don't say that you have to have a computer specialist. Those decisions are made locally. The schools themselves determine whether or not they want to have those positions, and whether or not they want to use PTR funding in order to accommodate that. So it will become a local decision as to what programs they want to offer in each community. If they choose to offer this program, then I'm hoping that we're going to be prepared to support it.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I don't think the Minister understood my question. My question is, we know that many school boards in the Inuvik area, Delta, Yellowknife for sure -- I don't know in other areas -- have been delivering full-time kindergarten programs, even though they have not been funded, even though it's actually illegal, really, technically speaking, because there was no legislation to say that. Now we're saying you can have a kindergarten program if you want to. But this only says minimum half time, or maximum full-time kindergarten. We're not saying, "Have full-time kindergarten." I guess one way of doing that, is because then we are only required to pay half of the kindergarten and not full time. But we're saying that you can have full-time kindergarten, but we're going to only legitimize half-time kindergarten; therefore, we're only going to pay for half-time kindergarten, knowing fully, and we are implicit in this, and we're condoning this, knowing fully that the school boards are not going to have money to, technically, deliver full-time kindergarten programming, and they have to take the money from elsewhere. So we're not exactly doing what we say we want to do and what we say we're doing. So I don't think we're going all the way. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Minister Dent.