PAC Site > Library

When doing research, one often uses documents which are hard to find, change, or are removed from the Web by the publisher. This page is intended to provide a permenant record of documents which provided data or insight into issues which were of importance to our school. They are provided here to save future researchers unnecessary labour and frustration.

Facility Planning Presentations

• 2000/2001 Space projects (Ministry of Education)
• 2005/06 SD68 Capital Plan (SD68)

Capital Planning Instructions

Every year the Ministry of Education Publishes "Capital Plan Instructions" which tells facility planners and Secretary Treasurers and Trustees how districts are supposed to plan their future Capital projects.

• 2005/2006
• 2006/2007
• 2007/2008
• Allowances, Rates and Costing Factors Supplement (Dry, for those that want to understand.)
• 2008/2009

Capital Planning & Childcare

The Ministry has made money available to convert extra public space into childcare space or community Hub Space.

• Capital Fundtin Q&A for Childcare seats Application and more information is available at http://www.mcf.gov.bc.ca/childcare/capital.htm

Enrolment

• SD68 enrollment and capacity-2006/2007 (School District 68)
• Analysis of elementary enrolment and utilization (2006/2007 School year - PAC Compiled)
• SD68 enrolment October 2007 - 1701 form (School District 68 submission to Ministry of Education)

Budgets

Budget information for SD68 is not readily available as recent budget documents have only been available in paper format to attendees of meetings, and historical budgets are removed from the school districts website.

2005/2006

• Draft Budget Presentation (SD68)
• Budget News Release (SD68)

2007/2008

• Estimated Operating Grant (March 2007 - Ministry of Education)
• Annual Facility Grant
• Operating Grants Manual Almost explains all the grants
• Annual Budget Instructions (March 2007 - Ministry of Education)

Financial Statements

SD68 Financial statements are in a format requested by the Provincial Governemnt and include all SD68 grants, including AFG grants and other items not discussed as part of the budget process. Ministry of Education Insructions to districts regarding Financial Reporting is available on their website at http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/accountability/district/

• 2005-2006 SD68 Audited Financial Statement
• 2006-2007 SD68 Audited Financial Statement
• 2007-2008 SD68 Audited Financial Statement
• 2008-2009 SD68 Audited Financial Statement

Annual Facility Grants (Annual Capital Grant prior to 2004)

• 2007/2008 Annual Facility Grant, provincial summary
• 2008/2009 Annual Facility Grant, provincial summary
These are available on the ministry website... so no need to include them all here...what isn't available is a running tally so one can see how the values change based on enrolement and school construction/closures....
• 2003/2004 to 2008/2009 AFG summary for BC based on annual provincial summaries provided by ministry of education.

Maps

• SD68 District Map (4MB pdf) - Map closely follows other catchment maps, but is not identical. Unconfirmed which is officially correct.
• Map of Nanaimo with clickable index of schools - including schools closed in 2004 (pdf)(c.Angus Weller, Weller Cartographic Services Ltd.)
• Map of all BC School Districts (BC Stats)
• Landmark and distances along every BC Highway (Useful if you want detailed distances while driving - Ministry of Transporation)

Projections and Planning

• Projection vs Actual (2006/2007) : North Nanaimo - Oceanfront (PAC Compiled from SD68 Docs)

Fertility

BC

• Health Area Fertility
• BC Fertility

Britain

• UK Population Increasing, higher fertitlity and migration credited (October 2007 - UK Nataion Statistics)
• UK & Foriegn-born women contribute to rise in fertility (December 2007 - UK National Statistics)

Development and Growth

• SD68 Building Stats (1997-2007) (PAC compiled from Cities of Nanaimo and Ladysmith)

Predicting The Number of Children in developments

• Yield Factors for Dwellings (1999) (Matrix for Ministry of Education)
• School Age Children by Dwelling Type(1999) (Matrix for Ministry of Education) - Shows how projections can be made, however neighbourhoods may vary wildly as can be seen from the PAC's 2006 census analysis

Census

• Map of Nanaimo Census Areas
• Summary of Public School Indicators for the Provinces and Territories, 1998-1999 to 2004-2005 Shows BC spending a smaller percentage of its education budget on teachers than any other province. page 40. Steadily decreased from 1998. Their "strike" may have changed the trend in 2006...maybe not. (Sourced from http://www.statcan.ca/english/research/81-595-MIE/81-595-MIE2007050.htm)

  Population, Fertility and Enrollment in other areas

  Looking at other jurisdiction is important as they provide a broader view as to how society and the world is changing. Schools and enrollment are greatly affected by population migration and fertility, and fertility trends tend to be universal among similar cultures. There are many other reasons for looking at what is happenining elsewhere.

  • Annual Demographics Stats, 2005 A little too much information in this document, however it shows age cohorts by province which is intereting to compare. Notable for elementary schools is that for 2001-2005 the number of children aged 10-14 remained virtually unchanged in BC.

District Operations, Comparisons & Analysis

• Teacher and Administrator stats 2003/04-2006/07. (Ministry of Education for SD68)

Summaries of Key Information - Ministry of Education

The Ministry of Education publishes a "Summary of Key Information" each year which shows short term trends and statistics for the province and also for each district. It is useful to see how a district compares to other districts.

• 2000/01
• 2001/02
• 2002/03
• 2003/04
• 2004/05
• 2005/06
• 2006/07

School Profile

Mount Benson

• 2006/2007 Class Composition and School Size Overview (Ministry of Education)

Food Guidelines

• Guidelines for Food and Beverage Sales, 2005 (Ministries of Education and Health)
• Guidelines for Food and Beverage Sales, revised 2007 (Ministries of Education and Health)

School Cleaning and Maintenance

• Garbage Management Guidelines (Marin Dept. of Agriculture)

Physical Education

School Sites

Site Size

School site size is important.

• Summary of Site Size Guidelines in US States. (CEFPI - School Building Association)
• Area Standards( 2003 - Ministry of Education) Gives the size of fields, classrooms, sites, etc

Site Design - Fields, Playground, etc

• The School Site Planner Covers playground, site selction, fields, etc.. excellent reference (1998 State Board of Education, North Carolina)

Mining

With the exception of the Old and New Wellington Townsites, the rest of the area is underlaid with mines. (Including Northfield.)

• Hazard Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (2006 - RDN)
• Indiana "What you need to know" regarding living around mines Subsidence page is the most relevant page
• Coal Fields of Nanaimo Good summary to compliment other papers. (i.e. Missing Wellington Explosion in list of major accidents, but it has a good list of accidents.)
• Minister of Mines report - 1880

Playground

Young children get most of the exercise on Playgrounds. Very important part of a school.

• City of Nanaimo Playground Program
• BCCPAC Playground Grant Winners (MB PAC applied, but didn't get drawn in the lottery)

Regional Planning

Schools are part of regional planning.

• Land Inventory Analysis for the Regional District of Nanaimo (2001)
• Population and Housing Projections for the City of Nanaimo 2006 to 2031 Nov 2006 (Urban Futures)
• Social Status Report for Nanaimo (2003)
• Paper discussing public facilities and their regeneration and role in the community. (2006 - Australia) Very interesting as it gives background and ideas on a very similar culture.
• Plan Nanaimo Update on progress towards goals (1998 City of nanaimo) Shows Town Centre densities in 1998 amongst other interesting items

Guides, Studies and Discussions on School Closures

Other districts reports and experience with School Closures and facility planning. Read with caution as the reason for school closures in one jurisdiction is often wildly different than the reason in another jurisdiction. The legal information is useful as it indicates that if a Trustee can be proven to be predisposed to closing a school, the boards decision to close the school can be set aside by a judge.

• Dick Chambers Report on howto close schools. (Public realm since it was commissioned with public money, and sent to every School Board in the Province)
• School Closures in Ontario: Who has the Final Say? (Candian Journal of Education Administration and Policy)
• Sooke "Learning Spaces" report with School Closure type info (Oct 2007)
• Impact of School Closures, University of Washington Study from 1974. This was one of the few in depth studies we could find on school closures. It study the impact of school closures which occured during the drop in birth rate and children which occured in the early 1970s due to increasingly available birth control and the end of the baby boom echo.

Facility Planning

SD68

Facility Audits

• Facility Audit form for the 2000 facility audits. VBA doesn't work, but it still shows that furniture gets ranked the same as movable furniture, even though the furniture can be replaced easily.
• Instructions for 2000 facility audit application
• Revised Facility Audit Manual (2000)

Other Districts

Long term facility planning requires alot of research. Here are some documents which show the varing degree of research and analyis done by diffrent groups when doing facility planning. Sometimes they discuss the complications with projections or other issues which provide improved perspective when looking at our own district.

• Sooke - Matrix Draft 4 facility plan (2005)
• Vernon School District Facility Plan (Matrix 2005) Like Sooke and Nanaimo, this report was prepared by Matrix, and like the Sooke version, the ministry requirements for approval of building *NEW* space is implicitly treated as a requirement, with some parts of it reading like the ministry requires 95% utilization in order to rebuild a school... incorrect.

Trustee Elections

Any volunteers to explain how this works?

• 2005 Election Candidates and Elected
• 2008 Official Election Results
• 2008 Official Election Results - Poll by Poll

Standardized Testing

FSA's and standardized testing have been a topic of discussion in recent years due to the Fraser Institues dubious practice of ranking schools without explaining how they do the ranking. For example a school can have good scores, but gets penalized because the boys and girls didn't get the same average score. This causes the Fraser Institute rankings to favour private schools with only one gender and large schools...one can see why it causes controversy.

• Large Scle Assessment Outcomes in British Columbia, 1876-1999 (Standardized testing, intersting since it appears to have existed for the entire History of Mount Benson/Wellington Elementary)
• 20 Questions & Answers on FSAs (2008 - Ministry of Education)
• Link: FSA Information: Ministry of Education
• BC Public School Employer's Association Information sheet on FSA administration. Has some interesting information on teachers right to expression, and if FSA's are considered optional.

Land, Crown Land & Grant Information

Mount Benson School effectively consists of 2 properties. The older property used to belong to Dunsmuir & Diggle Ltd, and was transferred to the Crown in 1900 when they withdrew most of their intrests from the area. The older property consists of most of the fields and is a neighbourhood park and local heritage site. This land is provincially owned crown land.

The land which the school building now sits was granted to the School District in 1956, 6 years after the new school was built. This land is considered a "Crown Grant", and the title is with the school district, but reverts to the Crown if the School District decides it no longer needs the land.

• Crown Grant and NRT information (2004 - BC Gov't)
• Ministrial Order M16-03 on disposal of land Per section 2, it does not apply to Crown Grant Land. Mount Benson sits on Crown Grant Land. See School Act for more info.

School District Land

School district has very kindly provided DPAC with a list of Surplus Property. They don't have a website yet, so it is here.

• SD68 Surplus Properties - January 2008

Historical Research

• Quick Guide to Land Records - BC Archives Research Guide
• Education Research Guide - BC Archives

School Size and Class Size

School Size and Class size have been topics of much discussion and research in recent years. While there is still some debate about class size, virtually all recent research has concluded that smaller schools are better for children.

Secondary School Size

The original proposal to build a new North Nanaimo Secondary School was the best option for students. Recent options to make Dover Bigger, or Wellington Bigger, Or Woodlands Bigger, are all ignoring accepted research that the MAXIMUM a secondary school should be is 600-900. We could probably add a 100 links to the documents below.

• Curriculum Adequacy and Quality in High Schools Enrolling Fewer Than 400 Pupils (9-12). ERIC Digest.
• Are small schools better? School size considerations for Safety & Learning. (2001. Policy Brief from West Ed. Funded by US Dept. of Education.)
• Comprehensive list of research documents on school size and class and classroom size
• Reference List of School Size Research (Gates Foundation Research and Evaluation)
• New Small learnings Communities: Findings From Recent Literature (2001 Kathleen Cotton)
• School Size, School Climate and Student Performance (1996 Kathleen Cotton - link to Northwest Regional Educational Labratory - School Improvement Research Series)
• Oregon Senate Bill 39 limiting school size ( 2001 )
• NSAA presentation to DPAC on optimal School size (January 2008)

School Year and School Day Planning

Balanced School year

Some arguments are made for balanced school years with a shorter summer, longer spring break, and longer Christmas. As usual, people claim not enough research, and opinions are divided.

• Background Report on Balanced School year (BCTF)

Year Round Schooling

Year round schooling is essentially the same as "balanced school year", except that it implies that the system will have multi-tracking which allows more children to be housed at one school. Year round schooling is commonly used because schools are too small and cannot handle the growth or student population of an area. SD68 currently doesn't have this problem, but with recent proposals to close and sell off many schools, continued population growth, and projected enrollment increases, facility shortfalls could become a reality in SD68. A "Balanced" school year could be the first step in moving towards multi-track year-round schooling. Google "Year round schooling" and you will get lots more information.

Shortened week, etc.

School Act

Version of the School Act which governs education in BC

• School Act - 2006-12

Misc