Former education minister David King launched new initiatives on Monday to get more Albertans involved in a discussion about Roman Catholic and Protestant separate schools in Alberta.
On Dec. 1, King launched an online petition, www.separateschooleducation.ca, intended to give Albertans the ability to decide whether to dissolve separate school boards.
The petition calls on the Alberta government to make separate school boards a referendum issue in the next provincial election.
Currently, the right of the religious minority, either Protestant or Roman Catholic, to establish a separate school district is enshrined in legislation. However, proposed changes to the Education Act, expected to be introduced later this year, may give the education minister the ability to reverse the status of separate and public school districts.
As a separate school board, St. Albert Protestant Schools has special rights not guaranteed for public boards chair Joan Trettler said last month. These include the right to exist, the right to elect trustees and the right to tax.
David Keohane, superintendent of the Greater St. Albert Catholic School Board, a public school board, said his board would be open to the idea of becoming a separate school board.
King said he is committed to keeping the conversation going, especially as the government prepares to introduce a new Education Act this spring.
“I see the conversation as being a fairly long-term prospect for Alberta,” he said.
“I look at Newfoundland where it was 10 years from the beginning of the conversation to the culmination in a referendum where the people of the province voted to disestablish their church-based school system and create a public school system.”
As of Tuesday, the petition had garnered 741 signatures and King said more than 6,000 people have visited the website since it was launched in December.
“Among the respondents, we’ve had a number of people who have indicated that they would like to help carry the conversation forward,” King said.
The new initiatives include publicizing the issue on a blog, making paper copies of the petition available for anyone who wants to collect signatures and information about how individuals can host a discussion in their community.
King said the campaign will add new elements on a regular basis.
“It’s a long term proposition for me and that means that on a pretty regular basis, we’ve got to be adding new elements to the conversation to encourage people to carry the conversation on and to extend the conversation.”
