Six Burnaby schools benefitted this month from a successful year of fundraising by the Burnaby Association for South East Side (BASES). The non-profit group, which runs a thrift store in the Edmonds neighbourhood, presented a $48,000 cheque at a school board meeting Tuesday.
Raised through thrift-store sales and direct donations, the money will go towards out-of-school programs and community-based activities at Stride Avenue, Edmonds, Twelfth Avenue, Morley and Windsor elementary schools and Byrne Creek Secondary School. For more information visit basesburnaby.ca or call 604-540-0110.
Child care coming?
Windsor Elementary School may soon get a before- and after-school child-care program. The school district’s buildings and grounds committee discussed a request to use an existing community portable at the school for a child-care program, and facilities staff have been directed to check out the portable to see if it would be appropriate and what work, if any, would need to be done to it.
“I’m sure it’s going to make it,” secretary-treasurer Greg Frank told the NOW. “I think it’s actually in good shape. The facility used to be used for child care.”
Historic winners
Burnaby South Secondary produced two award-winning submissions for the Government of Canada’s annual History Now competition recently. Grade 11 student Tim Cormier won an award and cash prize for an essay on the maple leaf as a symbol of Canadian unity, while social studies teacher Sabha Ghani earned a teaching prize for a project titled “Canada’s prime ministers: show me the money.” The latter is a group project designed to teach students about Canadian history by getting them to analyze the prime ministers on Canadian currency and pick a new one to go on a new $500 bill.
To find out more about the awards and see the winning entries, visit www.canadashistory.ca/History-Awards.
Two extra days off
Burnaby students will have two extra days off school this spring as teachers wrap their heads around the province’s new curriculum. The board of education amended its official calendar at a meeting last week to add two more non-instructional days: Tuesday, April 26 and Friday, May 13.
Local teachers and staff will use those days to familiarize themselves with the redesigned curriculum, which will be fully implemented in all schools in fall, 2016. The entire B.C. kindergarten to Grade 12 curriculum will be phased in by the 2017 to 2018 school year.
