Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m going to lend my support to this motion. It speaks about the functional grade level that the Alberta Achievement Test showed us sometime in March. It talked about the grade levels in our small communities, that we are measured at a lower grade level than the larger centres and that in the small communities students were graded or measured lower than, far too low than my expectations compared to the regional centres and

Yellowknife. That is totally unacceptable and if the social passing has some contributing factors to those low score levels, than we need to make some changes.

For example, through the Alberta Achievement Test, the Grade 9 students were very low in our communities. Only 15 percent of Grade 9 had shown an acceptable standard in the English language arts compared to 53 in regional centres and 61 in Yellowknife. Small communities also showed that 12.1 percent of Grade 9 students have achieved acceptable standards in mathematics compared to 40 percent in regional and 38 percent in Yellowknife.

We have a high level of low standards in our community. Many of our students who are graduating from high school are requiring upgrades before they enter college or university. Even when they enter into the workforce, they require extra training and extra schooling. The data suggests that it is the results of social passing, particularly with respect to high school students and a number of students who are exempt from taking the AAT, the Alberta Achievement Test. Many would be exempted because they would be two or three years below the enrolment of their grade level.

The Alberta Achievement Test results are terrible. The data says nothing why this is the case. The performance of school and the education system is obviously one potential reason, but there are many other social factors that contribute to the child’s success in the school. We have been trying to deal with that in the last eight years since I have been an MLA. This is my ninth year. There is a real difference between the Alberta Achievement Test and the functional grade level. I think that the government, the department needs to start looking at the social passing issue and get our students a fair chance in life and in this world to make it and not to allow this to continue when we have communities that are struggling, communities that we celebrate at graduation every year.

As we sit there, we think well, this child has to go back to school next year. These Grade 12 students only have to take one Grade 12 subject to get a diploma. That is not fair, Mr. Chairman. They should be able to take Grade 12 courses to be in Grade 12. Students do not have to…almost a norm, an acceptability that once you take your Grade 12 you would have to upgrade even to go to work unless you are very committed, strong parents, strong discipline to say I am going to take more than what is expected of me so I can go into university or college.

The social program passing, we need to change that. It might take awhile, but in the long run it will help us. It will help us with our students. We have to start somewhere. I have been an MLA for nine years. I can see it every year. I go back. The

leaders tell me that the students who have graduated are walking around with hands in their pockets in town. I heard it two years ago. I heard it last year, and say how come our education system…

We are pumping a lot of money into our education system. There might be some concerns that students who are 16 might be in Grade 4 or 5 and that is the issue we have to face in our school. We are not really doing any service to our children.

For myself the social passing is the easy way to get a diploma. It is a soft way. I think we need to make some changes that when a child enters into our education system, you know that child coming out at Grade 12 has a Grade 12 solid diploma and that Grade 12 diploma could get you into university, college or get into the workforce and say yes, that is a good school and the world will go around, that education is solid in the Northwest Territories. It is solid in our communities. They could go right into a university or college program in our community.

This motion hopefully will kick-start that long-term planning, struggle and work with the issues that need to be worked with. I look at that not only as an MLA here but also as a parent. It is a very fine line. Where does the MLA take a backseat and the parent comes out? Where does the parent come and take a backseat and the MLA comes out? That is a very fine line that I play, Mr. Chairman. I am very concerned. I have many constituents whose parents also have this issue with social passing, so much that they are sending kids out to Hay River, Yellowknife, Fort Smith and Edmonton because they are saying our education in our communities is not the way we want.

In closing, I take this analogy of also training my son to be a hunter or trapper. I would train him properly and train him so that when he is done at 16 or 14, I know he could survive on the land; not that I have to worry so much about him. That’s how I look at my education for my son on the land. That I could leave him there and he could survive and he’ll know how to hunt, he’ll know how to trap off the land. That’s what we need to look at for education for our children, but once they finish Grade 12 you’ll know that they can write a formula on how to get a mathematical problem, they know the formula and won’t have to take their computer or their calculator and say here it is, but they can actually explain a formula to me and they can write their name and they know that they can get a good job.

So we’ve got to be very, very serious about education. That’s how I look at it when I put it into the context of being on the land with my son, train him well that I know that if I die tomorrow that he will be okay and he can make it in the world. So that for me is an education and that’s how we need to look at our high school education.

Social passing for me, I think we’re taking the shortcut. That’s for me. My son is worth more than a shortcut to his education. So that’s why I’m supporting this motion. Thank you, Mr. Chair.