Burnaby's first all-candidates meeting for school trustees kicked off with a bang Tuesday night, as tensions ran high over bullying and the school district's antihomophobia policy.
School trustees from all four civic parties were present, along with two independent candidates, many fielding tough questions from the audience.
The event was held at the Burnaby Association for Community Inclusion's Norland Avenue office.
Candidates were given limited time to respond to questions they received ahead of time, followed by more questions from the audience of roughly a few dozen people.
The first round included TEAM Burnaby's Rennie Maierle, Gordon World from Burnaby Parents' Voice, Burnaby Citizens Association incumbent Larry Hayes and independent Jade Tomelden. The four were speaking on the issue of how the school district can work with community partners.
Hayes pointed to successful relationships with existing partners, such as CUPE workers, while Tomelden identified care for school-aged children and connection to community as two major issues.
Maierle called for a similar process to what was used in developing Burnaby's YOUth Hub, a centre for at-risk youth to get help for a variety of problems. He also criticized Burnaby Parents' Voice, (which formed out of opposition to the school district's gay-friendly policy) for being a special interest group.
World brought up Burnaby's changing demographics and students with special needs or those who speak English as a second language. Parents groups "may need some tweaking" to better accommodate people who don't speak English. He also called for improved communication with parents.
A Burnaby teacher got up and spoke of how he wants to encourage critical thinking and expose his students to many diverse ideas. He talked of an event he was involved in where students got to meet people of different ethnic, ideological and sexual communities.
"What I'm wondering," he said, addressing World, "considering your group's apparent obsession with homosexuals, what would the classroom look like in engaging the broader community with a Parents Voice board?"
World responded: "Effectively we are outsourcing the education of our children when we send them to school," he said. "All we are asking is, when there is discussion or things taught or discussed that we as a family do not agree with, we respectfully ask you to have our students to not participate in that. We are happy to fulfill those learning outcomes at home, ... but don't have us ask you to do something, and then not respect our directive."
At one point later in the evening, Tomelden's schoolaged son stepped up to the microphone and told the room he had seen a teacher tape another student's mouth shut.
He then asked the candidates what the appropriate disciplinary action would have been. (The alleged incident purportedly happened in a Vancouver school. Tomelden moved her son to a Burnaby school and decided to run for school trustee because of it.)
The boy's question apparently hit a nerve with a teacher in the audience, who got up and said the question was inappropriate and that the child had a responsibility to go to his teacher. The boy left the room, later returning in tears.
The woman addressed the crowd, saying it wasn't a criticism of the young boy.
"I just think as a teacher we would want that dealt with immediately, and I hope the principal of the school would have been notified immediately," she said. "There's no teacher in Burnaby that would accept that kind of behaviour from any of their colleagues."
Lau responded saying he would hold all people accountable, regardless of who was doing the bullying.
The second wave of candidates spoke on child poverty. Helen Ward, with Burnaby Parents' Voice, identified herself as single mom and called for food vouchers, (instead of food given out through schools) so parents could pick the food they prefer, and wanted to get advertising out of schools.
BCA incumbent Baljinder Narang pointed to the current initiatives, including Settlement Workers in Schools program, in which immigrant parents can get help for themselves and their children. She also cited some existing examples of district partnerships with the city's parks and rec department, which supplies leisure programs for kids; the Burnaby fire fighters, who bring snacks to schools; and Costco and Telus, who provide backpack and supplies for students.
"Resources end up being our biggest challenges," she said.
TEAM's Bonda Bitzer talked of finding efficiencies in the system, especially on the business administration side of the district. She also spoke of looking at practices that are working in other school districts.
"We should send out a search party to other districts and see if they are doing well and bring some of those practices to (Burnaby)," she said.
Bitzer opposed a return to local contract bargaining between school districts and the province when questioned by an audience member. At one point, another audience member criticized Bitzer, saying there were more grievances while she was working in the human resources department at the Burnaby school district, something Bitzer contested after the meeting.
Burnaby Parents' Voice candidate Charter Lau brought up an old email from a district staffer, apparently forwarded to one of the group's supporters in error, that suggested the district stall until after the election in responding to a Freedom of Information request from Parents' Voice regarding policy 5.45. Lau also spoke of his daughters, and said one asked him: "Daddy, when are you going to stop 5.45?"
"My daughter doesn't feel safe at school for some reason," Lau said, adding that is one of the reasons why he's running. "The school (district) must work hand in hand with parents."
TEAM's Pablo Su also got in the race because of policy 5.45, and said the current anti-bullying policy is not working.
Su wants student programs that foster good citizenship and reward acts of kindness. He also called for better earthquake kits for schools.
Independent candidate Franca Zumpano talked about the class composition issue and the need to retract and retain all Burnaby students. She also talked of selling the district's Duthie Union site, an old elementary school that is now a daycare and is used for district storage space.
"We could sell that for $10 million, put that money into our school for food resources etc.," she said, adding there should be more transparency in the system around funds from international education.
Green candidate Helen Chang, who is also a past school board member, talked of the need for something like the Hate Crime Statistics Act, an American piece of legislation that documents hate crimes.
