K-12 Education:
Our most valuable assets and resource are our children. Therefore, a strong education system ultimately means a strong British Columbia. To further bolster our K-12 education system we propose:
(i) Reinstate provincial testing, at elementary and secondary levels. This allows us to keep a finger on the pulse of the education process, so any deviation from the intended track can be caught early, and not after the high school results, when it’s really too late.
(ii) Cell phone and WiFi jammers in all secondary schools, which can be timed to be only in effect when classes are in session, and can be disabled in case of emergency by teachers or the office. It is unfair of us to expect our teachers to teach to a distracted audience. Let’s remove the distraction.
(iii) Teaching is an essential service and should be classified as such. In recent years all disputes between the BCTF and the government have ended up in arbitration. It is clear that trend will continue, so we propose to impose mandatory arbitration for any dispute that lasts more than 2 weeks. In education we must bee focused on the children, and must maintain a commitment to not jeopardize their education.
(iv) Our schools should also be a safe environment conducive to worry free learning. We propose the development of a province-wide school safety committee under the Ministry of Education. Their scope would encompass all safety issues such as earthquake readiness, elimination of bullying, making schools weapon-free, and so forth.
Continuing Education and Adult Learning:
We feel there should be more focus and attention on helping BC residents to retrain when their vocations are obsolete or threatened. It is a priority of the BC Action Party to keep the level of per capita production as high as possible, so British Columbia remains competitive in the world’s economy. We live in a changing world, and as technology advances, some chosen career paths will become obsolete. As career paths lose relevance, the BC Action Party as the government will partner with private and public sectors to help retrain people in those careers that need and desire to be retrained.