The Burnaby school district continues to add to its accumulated reserves, according to the 2017/18 amended budget.
A preliminary plan passed last April anticipated the district would have to dip into its reserves to the tune of about $600,000 by the end of the year to balance the operating budget, but the amended plan passed at a meeting Monday shows the district on course to finish the year $979,459 in the black.
The district is now expected to carry more than $8 million in surpluses into the 2018/19 school year – about $5 million in unrestricted reserves and $3 million in an international education reserve.
The latter – built up over three years – was put in place to cushion the district in the event of a sudden drop in international enrolment, according to secretary-treasurer Russell Horswill.
“I believe about half (our students) come from China,” he said as an example. “If all of a sudden something were to happen where Chinese students were no longer coming to international schools, then this would allow us to buffer the impact of that over the next fiscal year.
Changes in the amended budget include new spending on an in-house education assistant course ($70,000), school equipment ($400,000) and 10.5 new education assistant positions ($205,000).
Regular school-age enrolment grew by 75 students, which was 50 fewer than anticipated, according to Horswill, but enrolment of certain categories of special needs students grew by 15 more than anticipated.
The district also enrolled 41 more international students than predicted, and will take in $1.2 million more than anticipated in international and out-of-province tuition fees ($23 million instead of $22 million).
Additionally, the district got $12.6 million in extra funding to get in line with class-size, class-composition and specialist teacher provisions restored to B.C. teachers’ collective agreement after a Supreme Court of Canada ruling last school year.
The extra funds went towards 121.8 new teacher positions and 40 more education assistants.
The district also got an extra $1.9 million to relocate nine portables and modify three classrooms to create more classes.
