Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to say that I do support this motion for a couple of reasons. One is that I have been able to personally see this initiative in action twice now and it is providing education at the high school level to communities that would not normally be able to get the range of courses that they are getting through the e-learning initiative.
Secondly, I think the fact that this is being fully funded by the Beau-Del District Education Council is patently unfair. This is an initiative on the part of this particular district education council and they are being funded on a per capita basis the way every other school board is being funded, and yet this is an initiative that is of huge benefit to the department because it’s affecting the schools within this particular district, but they are also wanting to expand into the Sahtu, so it’s not just for this particular education district.
The department has to realize that an initiative like this, the Beau-Del has spent a lot of money over the last three, four, five years to develop this particular program, and it really ought to be funded by the department. It shouldn’t be funded by the district education council.