Key Communiqué

(From Katie Young, CBE's Communications Advisor)

Please share the information you receive in these emails with your school councils and parent communities.

System Meeting IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Please plan to attend our next System Information Session with the Board of Trustees. In this meeting you will have the opportunity to connect directly with the Board as a whole and with your school Trustee. For more information on the CBE Board of Trustees, visit their website. Here are the details for the meeting:

When: March 10, 2010

Time: 7:00 - 8:30 p.m. (doors open at 6:30 p.m.)

Location: Western Canada High School (641 - 17 Avenue S.W.) Free parking is in the lot off of 5A street

Topics: CBE Budget, 2010 Election and School Act Changes
If you have any questions you would like the Trustees to address in the meeting, please email them to me.

Area Meetings PLEASE NOTE CHANGES:

Area I: Wednesday, February 24 & Tuesday, May 11 2010 Location: TBA Topic: TBA

Area II: Monday April 19 Location: Area II Office Mountview Centre (2004 - 4 Street N.E.) Topic: TBA

Area III: Thursday, February 18 & Wednesday, April 28 6:30 – 8 p.m. Location: H W Riley (3743 Dover Ridge Drive S.E.) Topic: Three-Year Plan/ Area III plans for increasing student achievement.

Area IV: Thursday, May 6 Location: Area IV Office - Lord Shaughnessy (2336 - 53 Avenue S.W.) Topic: TBA

Area V: February 23 & May 11 7:00-9:00 p.m. Location: Area V Office Haysboro Centre (1123 - 87 Avenue S.W.) Topic: Three-Year Plan/ Area V Work

**(If you aren't sure which Area is yours, click here and scroll to the bottom of the page for a list of schools divided by Area)**

Provincial Budget:
Look for the announcement of the Provincial Budget on February 9th. Based on the provincial budget, CBE administration will go into budget preparation mode to create our proposed budget for the 2010-11 school year. They will then present it to the Board of Trustees for their consideration in a public Board meeting.

Arbitration Decision Settles Salary Question:
Education Minister Dave Hancock and the Alberta Teachers’ Association have announced that an arbitrator has reached a decision regarding the Alberta Average Weekly Earnings (AAWE) for teacher salary purposes. The arbitrator has declared that teachers working in the province’s public, separate and francophone schools should receive a salary increase amounting to 5.99 percent, reflecting the average increase in the weekly earnings of Albertans from 2008 to 2009.

The Calgary Board of Education is pleased that this difficult matter has been resolved. We will honour this decision by expediting the adjustment and retro pay from September 1, 2009 for all our employees impacted by the AAWE. The CBE is positioned to absorb the financial impact of this decision through our reserves and we will continue our strategic financial work during the upcoming budget deliberations.

We share a collaborative and productive working relationship with the Ministry of Education and we will continue to work with the Ministry on these challenges over the long term. Guiding our work is our strong belief that our teachers and support staff are the best in the country. Their contribution to the education of our students is absolutely critical.

Click here to see the press release from Alberta Education and the Alberta Teachers' Association.

Provide your Input on CBE Middle School Publications:
We are currently looking to update our publications/material on Middle Schools. If you are a middle school parent (or perhaps a prospective middle school parent) it would help us greatly if you took a moment to go through our material and email me your feedback.

We want to make sure our middle school publications and webpages give parents all the information they want and need to know about middle schools, and your input will help us do that. Thank you so much for your help.

CBE's Olympic Central Website:
The CBE'S National Sport School has four current students who are competing in the Vancouver Olympics, and another 17 alumni who are also competing. You can read more about the CBE's Olympic connections on our CBE Olympic Central website.

Key Communicator Steering Committee:
There is one vacancy (Area IV) for the Key Communicator Steering Committee this year. Thank you to all who have agreed to be a part of it. If you are interested, please email me for details.

Key Communiqué Archives:
If you missed (or misplaced) an issue of the Key Communiqué, or if you want to look back at past issues for reference, you can find them all archived here.

School Council Development
School Council Development (SCD) provides workshops and resource materials to assist school councils.

School Council Development provides the following services:

• Workshops for school councils anywhere in Alberta
• Toll Free School Council Consultation Line - 1-800-661-3470
• Instructor training to deliver workshops to school councils
• Resource manual and materials for school council

Alberta Education

School Council Resource Manual

CAPSC:
CAPSC is Calgary’s city-wide, public school parent association. CAPSC’s primary goal is to keep parents up to date and involved in their children’s education, and to help make individual school’s Parent Councils as effective as possible. CAPSC provides parents with resources, learning and sharing opportunities. They represent parent concerns to the CBE and all levels of government. For more information or to subscribe to their newsletter, visit http://www.capsc.ca/.