Jan 23 Key Communicator meeting

Hi All -

Last Thursday, I attended the Key Communicator meeting at Lord Beaverbrook High School. The house was hardly packed - the cold weather kept a lot of designated communicators at bay.

It was a nice showing by the CBE, however, with all Trustees making themselves available for presentation and comment. As well, Richard Walker (CEO of WorldSkills Calgary 2009) gave a fascinating, compelling talk on the many benefits of both hosting and attending the Worldskills 2009 event.

Here's what is posted on the WorldSkills website:

"Power. Passion. Precision. Craftsmanship. Camaraderie. Competition!

These six words represent the thrill, excitement and spirit of WorldSkills.

Every two years, over 900 of the best young professionals from trades, service and vocational programs around the world gather to showcase their talents and abilities. This thrilling, high-performance, four day WorldSkills Competition is the biggest event of its kind in the world.

WorldSkills was established in 1953. Today it is made up of 49 Member Countries/Regions worldwide. Participants compete for gold, silver and bronze medals – striving to set world-class standards in over 40 skill categories ranging from cabinetmaking to web design.

Yet WorldSkills is more than just a head-to-head challenge between aspiring professionals. It is a unique, not-for-profit, non-political, non-denominational association whose members are responsible for promoting vocational education and training in their respective countries/regions.

The organization’s mission is to bring attention to the high standards of skill, competence and excellence exemplified by trades and vocational professionals. WorldSkills serves to remind us that skilled trade and vocational professionals continue to play a critical role in the success of the modern global economy."

The website is worth going over.

Breakout sessions took place after the WorldSkills presentation, and I introduced myself to our Trustee, Carol Bazinet. She gladly listened to concerns from all of the parents of students in her wards (12&14) in attendance, and duly noted all. I brought up two issues that we'd talked about in Council meetings, security and the future of Haultain once the new Mackenzie Lake school is opened in 2010.

As was to be expected, Carol was non-committal where the issue of future student population was concerned. She did seem hopeful that there would be a large and growing pool of students from Calgary's southern communities that Haultain could school for years to come. Obviously, there is more to come as the situation develops. As it stands, Haultain isn't on this list. Let's hope it stays off!

Where the issue of security is concerned, it was interesting that more than one parent expressed their Councils' interests in installing video surveillance cameras on buses - after the mention of more than one incident involving bullying and/or poor behaviour on student transit.

I mentioned that we had wondered about the possibility of installing cameras in or around our school, and if there was a possibility that Carol could give me an official CBE stance on the subject and its legal implications and considerations that I could post on this blog, for the parents of Haultain children to read. She committed to getting back to me with an answer.

There's an Area V meeting, which takes place on Thursday of this week that I will be attending. I'll post a summary of my learnings on that hopefully on Friday or on the weekend.