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The Funding of Public Schools Executive Summary A good education system is essential to the advancement of society. In recent years, British Columbia’s education system has deteriorated significantly, primarily due to inefficient education policies and inadequate funding. The funding shortage has affected not only the general learning system but also special needs schools in the province. Children with special needs and learning disabilities do not receive the level of care they need, which could potentially worsen their conditions. This report provides a description of the problems facing the education system in British Columbia and offers solutions. It proposes that the government should increase its funding to public schools and make it compulsory for teachers to learn how to teach special needs students.
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Table of Contents Introduction.......................................................................................................................3 Solving School Funding Shortages...................................................................................3 Solving the Issue of Special Schools.................................................................................5 Conclusion.........................................................................................................................6 Recommendations.............................................................................................................7
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Introduction Teaching is an honorable profession that involves imparting training and knowledge that helps to transform individuals and societies. Education is one of the greatest equalizers in society; it is a stepping stone to opportunities for people of all walks of life and lays the foundation for a stronger society since it enables innovation, upward social mobility, and amicability. Despite the numerous benefits of education in society, the education system is structured in a manner that is disadvantageous to teachers and students. This paper analyzes the issues of underfunding and inclusivity and special needs in British Columbia’s education system. The paper also offers solutions and recommendations to these problems. Solving School Funding Shortages British Columbia has one of the highest rates of poverty and social inequality among the provinces of Canada. Investing in education is therefore paramount because it is the key to a better future for the economy and society; education boosts societal well-being. Well-funded schools have better educational facilities, motivated teachers and a better learning environment than underfunded schools (Alexander, Salmon, & Alexander, 2015). As a result, students who attend well-funded schools have a better chance of getting a good quality education and a higher chance of academic success. To solve the issue of funding in British Columbia, it is essential for the government to establish the budgetary needs of public schools, develop an equitable school funding system and allocate sufficient funds to each school. It is necessary to ensure that schools in high poverty areas receive high-quality education services such as well-trained teachers, rigorous curriculums and extra-curricular activities. Minimizing inequities in education funding
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facilitates the creation of a more equal and just society and helps to alleviate the living conditions of marginalized communities. The issue of teacher shortage in British Columbia can best be addressed by increasing funding to the education sector. This will enable the state to firstly, raise teachers' wages and secondly, hire more teachers. By doing so, qualified teachers will be motivated to seek employment in public schools, and as a result, this will increase the number of teaching staff in the public school system. This strategy will also facilitate the reduction of the teacher to student ratio, providing an opportunity for students to access more individualized attention and better quality education. British Columbia has sufficient financial resources to invest in public education; however, the government's budgetary policies and priorities have worked to the public school system's demerit (Adamson, Astrand, & Darling-Hammond, 2016). For instance, in 2016, the government allocated over $300 million of its tax revenue to the funding of private schools, whereas there was a shortage of funds in public schools. Compared to other Canadian provinces, British Columbia’s school funding is the lowest at approximately $1,000 lower per student (Hemingway, 2016). When allocating funding to public schools, the government must consider that there are several costs associated with the provision of good-quality education, these include; medical services, science laboratories, computers, and other information technologies, classroom equipment, sports facilities, and teachers' salaries and benefits. The government must also factor the increase in commodity prices due to the rise in the inflation rate. When costs increase without an increase in the budgetary allocation to public schools, it compromises the quality of education offered. Increases in school funding is a crucial
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investment in the future of British Columbia; it attracts qualified teaching personnel, enables the improvement of the curriculum and also enables the acquisition of good-quality educational and extra-curricular equipment. Solving the Issue of Special Schools Special education in British Columbia does not provide good-quality education and care to children with special needs. The province does not have enough educational facilities and teachers for this group of students. As a result, special needs classrooms have one teacher teaching a large number of special needs students, which lowers the quality of the education offered. Additionally, for children to be admitted into the special school program, the government requires assessments to diagnose the child as having special needs. The process of getting the diagnosis takes a long time, thus delaying the admission of children with special needs into school (Norwich, 2014). As a result, making it more challenging for this group of children to receive early intervention. One of the main solutions to this issue is to eliminate the bureaucracies around the special needs assessment process. The government should ensure that the standard time for the tests to be carried out is one week; more prolonged than that would necessitate an investigation into the delay. This intervention would enable children with special needs to enroll into school earlier. Special needs schools in British Columbia are severely under-staffed, such that the students in these schools do not receive enough personalized attention from their teachers. To solve this problem, it is essential to increase funding to special schools such that special needs schools teachers' wages are boosted. This will motivate more teachers to enroll in special educational needs training programs. Additionally, the Ministry of Education should design
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and incentivize short and long courses to enable teachers to learn to teach special needs classes. In so doing, this will reduce the teacher shortage issue and would allow teachers to work with a wide range of students who have special needs. The government should also address this issue by increasing the number of public special needs schools and also increasing inclusivity in public schools; this will give more special needs students an opportunity to receive a better quality of education by decongesting the current special needs classrooms (Hemingway, 2016). In the United States, the Department of Education has a history of incorporating special needs students into the general education classroom and ensuring that the learning curriculum encompasses the needs of all students. This strategy enabling children with learning disabilities to receive a quality
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education and also promotes a culture of tolerance, respect, and understanding.
(Source: https://bctf.ca/publications.aspx?id=49000)
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(Source: https://bctf.ca/publications.aspx?id=49000) Conclusion In the course of this research, I was surprised to learn that while there is a severe funding crisis in British Columbia’s public schools, private schools have been receiving a significant amount of funding out of citizens’ tax money. This was an indication of the government's poor prioritization in making budgetary allocations. The information I found most useful was that almost any teacher could become a special needs education instructor by enrolling into a training program where they learn how to teach children with various learning and developmental disabilities. Year One students would benefit from this research because it provides an analysis of the challenges in British Columbia's public education system. This information would help them lobby for the improvement of the public school system in the province. Recommendations
The government should include teachers and heads of educational institutions in
preparing its budget for public schools. This will ensure that schools are well-funded and thus able to provide quality education to all students
The government should make it mandatory for teachers to learn special needs
education teaching as a course in college, to address the perpetual shortage of special needs school instructors.
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References Adamson, F., Astrand, B. and Darling-Hammond, L. (2016). Global Education Reform: How Privatization and Public Investment Influence Education Outcomes. Routledge. Alexander, K., Salmon, R., & Alexander, F. (2015). Financing Public Schools: Theory, Policy, and Practice. New York: Routledge.
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Hemingway, A. (2016). Retrieved from https://www.policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/BC %20Office/2016/08/ccpa-bc_Kto12EducationFunding_web.pdf Inclusive Education and Special Needs in BC fact sheet. (2019). Retrieved from https://bctf.ca/publications.aspx?id=49000 Norwich, B. (2014, January 3). Recognising Value Tensions That Underlie Problems in Inclusive Education. Cambridge Journal of Education, 44(4), 495-510.