What's the plan for adult learning in small N.W.T. communities? MLAs want to know
How will the territory support learning in small N.W.T. communities after Aurora College announced in January it would shut 19 community learning centres?
That's the question MLAs asked Education, Culture and Employment Minister Caitlin Cleveland at the Legislative Assembly on Friday.
"These closures unfairly target Indigenous communities and will make education less accessible for Indigenous learners," said Sheryl Yakeleya, the MLA for the Dehcho.
"Our people need more learning opportunities at home and in our own communities."
Four other members had similar comments, and asked Cleveland how her department would fill the gap once the centres close at the end of June.
"We should be doing more for small communities, not less," said Jane Weyallon Armstrong, the MLA for Monfwi.
Based on how much funding the government of the Northwest Territories provides to Aurora College — $35 million in base funding for the 2023-2024 fiscal year — MLAs emphasised the need for the government and the college to be aligned.
Cleveland said the Department of Education, Culture and Employment was working with Aurora College to determine the college's plan moving forward and then, she said, the department can come up with its own plan to fill the gaps.
"Because they still do maintain the responsibility at the end of the day of ensuring that there are access to education and access to employment opportunities within communities."
Caitlin Cleveland, the territory's education minister, says her department plans to fill gaps left by Aurora College's decision to close 19 of its community learning centres. (Julie Plourde/Radio-Canada)
Cleveland said any funding the college doesn't use comes back to the department and the government can use that money to advance education opportunities across the territory.
Cleveland also said her department has been hearing from communities and Indigenous governments that have their own ideas of how they'd like to use the facilities, though she didn't provide more detail on what some of those ideas are.
"Although this has been certainly a shock to the Northwest Territories, I think we're in a really good position and have an opportunity in front of us to re-envision what these centres become and what adult learning looks like in communities," Cleveland said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Forbes
4 hours ago
- Forbes
What's Harder? Planning Interest Rates, Or Harvard's Class Of 2029?
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS - JUNE 29: People walk through the gate on Harvard Yard at the Harvard ... More University campus on June 29, 2023 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that race-conscious admission policies used by Harvard and the University of North Carolina violate the Constitution, bringing an end to affirmative action in higher education. (Photo by) Regarding the makeup of Harvard's student body, President Trump thinks 15 percent is a more advisable number than 25 when it comes to international students. Quite reasonably Trump's critics, and surely many who are fans of Trump, are astounded by his conceit. How could the President effectively plan Harvard's student body? Also, since foreign students pay full tuition, it's entirely possible that their payments make it possible for needier Americans to secure spots at Harvard. Or maybe not. What's important with Harvard, and with all schools, is that Presidents, Senators, experts and agitators more broadly should stay out of their admission decisions. And for those who say that Harvard is 'unique' since so many federal dollars flow its way, please stop right there. The thinking is nonsensical. Precisely because the federal government is so large, and for being large operating well beyond its constitutionally limited scope, theoretically nearly every U.S. individual, business and non-profit university is getting something from the government. Let's not expand on the wrong of a federal government lacking boundaries through the excusal of even worse trespasses. Hands off individuals, businesses, and universities. Plus, the arrogance of it all! Harvard is easily one of the most difficult 'fat envelopes' in the world to attain, yet Trump thinks he can plan the class's demographic makeup? That's like the government planning U.S. imports or exports…Oh wait, they sometimes do that. Or try to. Ok, it's like the government attempting to plan the cost of credit to our alleged non-inflationary betterment…Oh wait, they presume to do that too. Interviewed recently by New York Times reporter Colby Smith about the direction of interest rates, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland president Beth Hammack seemingly wrung her hands as she told Smith, 'I legitimately do not know which way this is going to break.' Hammack added that she would 'rather wait and move quickly to play catch up if I really don't know what the right move is. And right now, I really don't know what the right move is based on all of the information and policies that we're responding to.' Some reading the above will conclude that Hammack was being modest, sober in making a difficult assessment about what's ahead, stuff like that. They would conclude incorrectly. The only correct answer from central bankers wouldn't be a professed willingness to delay blind stabs at market intervention, but to instead instruct Smith on the absurdity of the question. Lest everyone forget, people borrow money for what it can be exchanged for. In other words, the cost of credit is the cost of accessing exchange media that can be exchanged not for one market good, but for every market good in the world. Which is a reminder that other than perhaps the dollar that exists as the world's currency, the price of credit is easily the most important price in the world. And exactly because we're all so different now and in the future, there's an interest rate for every single person, business and university in the world, all arrived at through the relentless collision of infinite global inputs every millisecond of every day. Remember this as Hammack and central bankers like her oh so modestly tell Smith 'I legitimately do not know which way [what the Fed will do with 'interest rates'] this is going to break." Wrong answer, and wrong question. Hammack should have replied to Smith that a central banker planning something as complicated as the cost of credit would be as foolhardy as a president planning Harvard's class of 2029, multiplied by many millions.
Yahoo
7 hours ago
- Yahoo
Now is the time for all Americans to come to the aid of their country
(Photo: Brandon Kingdollar/NC Newsline) So, I was at a protest last month in Cleveland, where I was visiting my dying mother. I told her I needed to leave her to go downtown for the protest on that damp, windy spring day. She understood. The turnout was okay. My reporter's eye would have put the crowd at around a thousand. I usually attend protests in Raleigh, and the one a couple weeks previously hit around five thousand, though I'm told the protest I missed while I was in Cleveland was somewhat smaller. A little more recently I went to another protest, and that hit a nice crowd of maybe 500 or more in downtown Durham on a Thursday afternoon. Then I was going to join the one in Raleigh on the same day but a friend said don't bother, it's ending and had only a few hundred people. So, I have a single question, a question for the folks of Cleveland and Raleigh and North Carolina and everywhere else: Where the hell are you people? What are you waiting for? Illegal deportations? Check. Anonymous secret police grabbing people up and disappearing them regardless of rights or status? Done. Wholesale refusal to respect the Constitution, whether that means abiding by judicial rulings and the emoluments clause or simply respecting citizens' first, fourth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendment rights? Already there. Nothing is lacking; all the signs and actions are there. The current regimes — both in North Carolina and Washington DC — do not respect the courts, the ballot box, the people, or the rule of law. And here came nationwide protests and you — you personally! You! — where the hell were you? What, did you have errands to run? Yoga? The lawn looked like a mess? You had the sniffles? 'I was GOING to stand up to fascism,' we will say in the future, 'but I had an orthodontist appointment.' We laughed scornfully about Trump's refusal to honor World War I dead in France because of rain. Well, where the hell are we and what's keeping us away? You guys: we don't have time for this bull. I mean we don't have time for all the protests, sure; that's part of the plan. If we're exhausted and poor and worn out, we're less likely to protest. But just like you never have time for a doctor's appointment until what the doctor could have quickly solved puts you in the hospital or the grave? We either protest now like our lives depend on it — spoiler alert — or we let them do as they please with our lives. Those are the only options. Nobody is coming to help us; those who can, like corporations (with the usual few noble exceptions: Penzeys, Ben & Jerry's, Costco) or political leadership, won't. Those who wish they could (the entire rest of what we once called the free world) can't. It's us or nobody. And just the way more than a third of our population looked at a choice between trying to solve our problems on the one hand and electing a vast new and terrifying parcel of much worse problems on the other, said 'So sorry, busy, can't be bothered,' you — You! You personally! — are going about your business. Dude. Your business is saving your life. You may love the game you're playing on your phone, and you should play it and enjoy it — but if you fall into the sea while you're playing it, don't keep playing: swim for your life. You may need to work out for your health, but if someone tries to kidnap you while you're jogging by, you don't get to say, 'I'd love to fight back, but, you know: leg day.' You have to inconvenience yourself. A meme went around during the first Trump administration that said, 'I don't know how to explain to you that you should care about other people.' It was a wonderful symbol of the great divide among us. Now we're in the same place, only I'm talking to my fellow non-Fascist Americans. I don't know how to tell you that when someone is trying to enslave you, you fight: you fight and you do not stop fighting, because it's now or never. I'm told that if we get 3.5 percent of the people in the streets, we're going to win. What are we telling them if we don't? My wife tells me she has been taught that if someone has her in their control and plans to rape her, the calculations are complex. If I choose to go along, will that let me live through it? Should I run? Can I keep him talking? Will fighting make things worse? It's unimaginable but correct: whatever keeps you alive, do that, and live to work through the horrible consequences. But if in that situation your captor tries to pull you into a vehicle? Fight for your life: you won't come back out. Once he gets you in that car? You're as good as dead. Fight. You guys, they've got us, and they're trying to pull us into the car. I personally am fighting for our lives. What do you plan to do? June 14th there's another nationwide protest, scheduled for the same day as the idiot birthday parade. You guys, it's now or never. Fight or die.
Yahoo
8 hours ago
- Yahoo
Decoupling a common sense solution to Wisconsin school funding conundrum
Education is not a zero-sum game, but unfortunately divisive politics and ideologies are holding us back. At the end of the day, public schools, charter schools, private schools, homeschooling, all offer unique choices for parents and families and should be seen as part of one education ecosystem. Funding education, however, is proving to be a difficult endeavor. And it's not a Republican or Democrat issue and, frankly, not just a problem here in Wisconsin. All 50 states are dealing with the expiration of COVID-19 relief funds and uncertainty over how federal education dollars will be distributed in the coming years. Additionally, choice schools and public schools are going to need to find a way to coexist. And it can happen as long as we have a sincere discussion about how education in Wisconsin is currently funded and what we can do to improve it. At the heart of this issue is what I believe to be a false notion that school choice 'siphons' money away from public schools. That's a political slogan—not a fiscal reality. When a student uses a voucher, the public school no longer incurs the cost of educating that child. While state aid to the district is reduced, the district can—and almost always does—raise its property tax levy to recoup the lost revenue. Giving the school the same level of funding to teach fewer students. About 1,153 students in the Green Bay Area Public School District use a voucher to attend a private school, amounting to $12 million in state aid. That's just 3.8% of the district's $311 million budget—even though those students represent over 6% of enrollment. A similar story holds statewide. On average, Wisconsin school districts receive $15,569 in state and local revenue per student, while choice schools receive $10,798. Statewide, spending on choice students represents about 4.6% of total educational spending even though choice students are about 6.5% of total enrollment. Bottom line: taxpayers are getting more value per dollar. Opinion: Wisconsin must follow the lead of Florida and Tennessee on how it funds schools Opinion: Wisconsin is failing to fund education. State budget must make this right. Some have raised concerns about the property tax implications. In fact, property taxes are the most hated tax, especially for fixed income households. But there's a solution: decoupling public and private school funding so one doesn't affect the other. The Legislature introduced such a reform last year. Gov. Evers, who supported the idea as state superintendent, can once again consider it in this year's budget. Decoupling means separating choice program funding from public school funding in Wisconsin. Instead of seeing their funding reduced and having the ability to make up for it through higher property taxes, public schools would see their funding exist entirely separately from private school choice and charter schools. Public school funding would be more stable, and property taxpayers would see their burden eased. Statewide, the non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau estimates decoupling would save property taxpayers more than $342 million. I learned more about decoupling's 'positive' effects at a Green Bay Common Council meeting where Council member Brian Johnson touted decoupling as a potential 'common sense' solution, because it provides stable and reliable funding from state coffers, not constant property tax increases on local residents. Opinion: We asked readers about wake boats on Wisconsin lakes. Here's what you said. The policy solution exists, and it's been out there for quite some time. The question is whether lawmakers and the governor are willing to make a difference. Let's be clear: if you like your public school, nothing changes with decoupling. In fact, it provides the school with consistent state funding. And for thousands of families across Wisconsin — especially low-income and working-class families — decoupling keeps the ability to choose the best school with the family. Cate Zeuske is an education reform advocate, former elected official, and resident of Brown County. This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Choice and public schools need to coexist. Here's how. | Opinion
