Next school year, Rocky View Schools will allocate $2,589,000 to its schools thanks to the Classroom Improvement Fund (CIF).

The CIF was part of the agreement made between the Teacher Employer Bargaining Association and the Alberta Teacher's Association in May. Thanks to the CIF, the Alberta Government will distribute $75 million in one-time funding to school divisions in the Province. Each school division needed to form a committee  that would decide how to distribute their share of the pie.

Rocky View Superintendent Greg Luterbach explained that their committee came up with a formula where every school regardless of size recieves $20,000, and the remainder is distributed based on $72 dollars per student. All the money will be given to the schools, with none retained centrally by RVS.

The Government mandated that the money must be used for classroom improvement, and gave four general criterian on how to spend the money that Rocky View fleshed out further.

"One was around additional teaching staff, one would be additional support staff. one would be about enhanced professional learning, and the last could be materials and/or equipment," said Luterbach. "Our committee sat down and we looked at those four general categories. We provided a little bit more detail."

Luterbach said schools could add teachers to support specific students from vulnerable populations, or take the money to spend on books or supplies for maker spaces. The list of additional criteria from Rocky View was based on initiatives already underway in the division.

One thing the schools can't spend the money on is new technology hardware. Luterbach explained that, since the money is one-time only, there were concerns about additional future costs once hardware became obsolete, or the need to hire additional technology support. They were worried allowing hardware purchases would become too costly in the long run.

"We just felt that we do a pretty good job overall around supporting technology, so we felt that this $2.5, $2.6 million didn't need to be targetted towards computer hardware. If a school wants to buy some software licenses, that's perfectly fine."

Overall, Luterbach was ecstatic about the boost Rocky View schools will receive.

"It is great news to have some additional funds to be able to put in there to empower schools. We certainly felt that schools themselves are in the best position to allocate this money and that they know what they're working on, they know some of their pressure points or where a few extra dollars can make a positive difference."

Luterbach said in the few days since the funding was announced, he's already heard from three schools, including one in Airdrie, on how they plan to use the money. One plans to hire a numeracy coach to work with other math teahcers, while another will provide release time for teachers to collaborate and build on projects they are already working on.

 

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