Proposal for another Alberta School of Public Choice

Currently, I am wrapping up work on approval of Maple Tree Bilingual Charter School for Somali and families of African descent in Calgary Alberta. This is the second charter school that I have designed for a group of Calgary parents. The first school was for a group of Middle Eastern and Asian parents who were distressed about the high dropout rates among immigrant students in Calgary. Almadina Charter School, with its emphasis on English as a Second Language strategy, was among the first Alberta schools to receive a public school charter from the Minister of Education. Since 1995-1996, Alberta has still been the only Canadian province that has approved the creation of up to 15 charter public schools of parental choice. Provincial governments have not created public charter schools since all other provinces fear the backlash from the teacher associations and entrenched bureaucracies and school board associations. Alberta government has led the country in educational reforms first during the 1930s with its Enterprise experiments and now with it charter public school movement. This bold experiment is kept in check by a vigilant provincial Ministry as well as a charter that must be externally assessed and renewed every five years.  

Alberta’s 13 charter public schools receive the same per pupil funding as their public counterparts but are not supported with any direct capital building grants. They must lease a facility and submit to an annual assessment based on about 16 public Accountability Pillars. These assessments are made up of surveys to stakeholders and Provincial Achievement and Diploma Tests for Grades 3, 6,9,12. The charter schools have exerted enormous pressure on the Alberta Teachers’ Association and Public and Private Schools to be more accountable for learner outcomes and value for money invested in public education.  Each of these charter public schools of parental choice need to articulate and deliver results based on their unique educational vision and mission.

In order for Alberta parents to be granted a charter, public meetings must be held and a proposal submitted to a local Public School Board. If the proposal is rejected after 60 days of review, to the Alberta Minister of Education AND Ministry officials have a mere 30 days to accept or reject the proposal. Each proposal should be accepted or rejected based on educational criteria and innovative approaches to enhance learner success for that niche of students.

Maple Tree Bilingual School proposal has several unique aspects.  Instruction in the student’s heritage language occurs at the same instructional block during the day so that a pan-African student may study the international language of choice: Somali, Sudanese dialect or Arabic. The charter proposes to have a The Parental Bilingual Support Center in order to encourage and enhance parental skills and involvement in supervising a child’s homework, e-learning and cyber citizenship skills or assisting a child to reach his or her full bilingual, as well as learning, potential.  This feature addresses the wide social and acculturation gaps that sociologists have pointed out exists between an African immigrant parent and child and between the family and wider Alberta society.

For more details about the proposed Maple Tree Bilingual Charter School or if you need a speaker or more information about Alberta’s Charter School s movement and implications for Public School Policy Reforms in your province, please comment or e-mail me at pier.depaola@shaw.ca