Candidates Questionnaire Week Four: Supporting Students with Diverse Learning Needs

Welcome to the fourth in a series of weekly articles we’re calling Candidate Questionnaires. Once a week, The Nest sends school board candidates from all six major political parties one or two questions, for their written responses to be published here. Responses are only edited for clarity.

Last week, we asked candidates:

• How will you support students with diverse learning needs?

Their responses are below. Candidates have been grouped by their political party, listed in a randomized order. Candidates under each political party are also listed in a randomized order. Please send your questions to ehnewspaper@gmail.com, and enjoy learning about the people running for your school board.

Vote Socialist

Karina Zeidler

On our website, votesocialist2022.ca, our Education policy platform says that we will:

Demand reductions in class sizes and ensure that all students with additional needs are provided with adequate support to facilitate their full participation in in-class activities, to the extent of their ability;

Develop strategies to support students with a variety of interests and diverse and neurodivergent learning needs, including self-directed learning, trades opportunities, arts, technology, physical activities, and science electives, hybrid home-school schedules, and enhanced outdoor learning opportunities;

and

Provide free and timely psycho-educational assessments for neurodivergent learners.

We also have to stop requiring a diagnosis before students get extra funding. A kid that needs help should just get that help, right away. For free. They shouldn’t have to jump through numerous hoops before we start helping them. Right now, it takes years to get a psycho-educational assessment through the public system. So parents are forced to pay for a private assessment. Easier for rich parents. That’s unfair. 

Most of all, we need to listen to students with diverse learning needs and their families, to find out what they need, and then give it to them.

But all of this costs money, and the provincial government has been starving the education system here for decades now. You can’t get blood out of a stone. If we are serious about supporting students with diverse learning needs, we have to tax the rich, to properly fund schools. 

School trustees have to be activists. They have to actively and publicly shame the provincial government for the way they are defunding the school system and hurting everyone.

Vision Vancouver

Hilary Thomson

This issue is personal for me - I have a child with a disability, and I have done a lot of advocacy for her. Part of the reason I am running is to help make our schools more inclusive for children with disabilities. 

I use the term “disabled” or “disability” intentionally. When we use terms like diverse needs instead of rights-based language, it is easy to overlook the fact that some of these issues involve fundamental human rights. Properly funding inclusion requires money, and we need to advocate for a better funding model for children with disabilities with enough resource teachers, support workers and other professionals, like speech-language pathologists or counsellors. 

We also need a plan to make sure our schools and grounds are accessible. As a trustee, I would support a fulsome accessibility strategy that is created in consultation with people with disabilities. We also need to ensure we are properly supporting children with intellectual and learning disabilities. For example, part of our accessibility strategy should include supporting teachers in providing early, evidence-based interventions for children who struggle to learn to read. We also need to ensure we are providing enrichment opportunities in an equitable way.

Finally, we know that many children with disabilities can be excluded from the education system, or even leave it altogether, a problem that is being effectively highlighted by organizations like BCEdAccess. As a trustee, I would support adopting a way for parents to report incidents of exclusion so we can better understand when it happens, and address it.

Steve Cardwell

Every child matters and every child must have access to the services they need to support their individual success. Throughout my career, I have been a strong supporter and advocate for students with diverse learning needs. In my current role as Vice President, Students at Kwantlen Polytechnic University, I continue this work through my support of educators implementing the All Citizens Project which involves the full inclusion of students with intellectual disabilities into courses at KPU, and through my direct support to members of my team who are responsible for Accessibility Services.

As an elected school trustee, I will ensure that we have sufficient resources dedicated to early identification and intervention. I will advocate for training models for staff that focus on anti-discrimination, including anti-ableism. I will support front-line workers who have responsibility for the educational needs of students with diverse learning needs, including physical, intellectual and emotional challenges.

I will continue my strong support for the Alternate Programs, that I often visited during my time as Superintendent at the VSB. Having been trained in and taught programs for gifted students, I will support programs that emphasize their unique needs as differentiated from enrichment.

Kera McArthur

As someone who went through school with undiagnosed learning disabilities and the mother of a child who is hard of hearing, I have been thinking a lot about how we ensure our schools are inclusive places where all our children can thrive.

I don’t have all the answers, but here are some ideas the Vision Vancouver School Board team is working on. First, we would create a comprehensive human resource plan focused on supporting public education. This would include training, recruitment, and retention to address the shortage of teachers and support staff for those with diverse learning needs. The plan would also look at how to provide supports for educators to create inclusive classrooms (meaning having enough resource teachers/EAs and also substitutes for these important non-enrolling roles).

Physical access to all learning spaces (playgrounds, public schools) is hugely important and should be available to all. My fellow Vision Vancouver candidates and I are committed to building not just an inclusive school community but inclusive, accessible physical spaces. 

We need better data. Vision Vancouver is proposing that the School Board set up a better system to track incidents of exclusion, so we better understand how and why this is happening. This will allow us to create comprehensive plans to make our schools more inclusive.

Continued advocacy is also key. A Vision Vancouver majority on School Board will advocate for improved funding models that recognize the diversity of need, and which are not based solely on diagnosis.  We will also advocate for early identification and intervention of students with learning disabilities, and ensure there are district resources to provide evidence-based reading interventions.

Finally, I don’t have all the answers, but think it is important to listen and work cooperatively with parents, caregivers, teachers, staff, administrators and children themselves to look for innovative approaches. Education is a human right, and every child has the right to be accommodated in their neighbourhood school in an inclusive classroom.

Allan Wong

I will continue to strongly advocate for proper funding of the education system.  This particularly means offering much needed programs for our students with diverse learning needs. I see the positive effects of lower class size averages which offers more one on one time for a better learning environment. Wherever possible, children should be accommodated in their neighbourhood schools in inclusive classrooms.  That means supports available in their own school.

The Board needs to share reports to objectively educate stakeholders, the public and the Province. For example, we must tell everyone that the District spends over $10 million annually on special needs programs than what we receive from the Province. We know this is not enough and I have/will strongly advocate for proper funding. I know programs that support student learning and I must ensure they are available for our students. I listen to students/teachers/parents and understand goals of school-based teams to know what is required. Then it is up to the Trustees to advocate and ensure those programs are available for our students’ advancement. 

Personally, I became a Trustee because there was a lack of Speech-Language Pathologists in the District that could support students.  This is just one area that is so woefully underfunded. In the past, I (and the Board at the time) have personally put my position as a Trustee on the line to advocate to the province for proper funding of Vancouver’s public education. 

Aaron Leung

Building an inclusive public education system starts by ensuring those with additional needs have the services they require at their neighbourhood school. Where possible, students should be accommodated in their neighbourhood school in inclusive classrooms. I know how important neighbourhood schools are for students and parents. We need to ensure that no matter where you live in Vancouver that students receive the same level of service.

Creating and maintaining inclusive schools requires good planning and good advocacy. On the planning front, we need to ensure that our schools are staffed appropriately so that resource teachers and EAs aren’t pulled away from the students that need them. To achieve this, we need a human resource plan focused on training, recruitment and retention for all of the roles within our public education system. To aid this, we also know that the public education system is underfunded. I will strongly advocate for more funding for Vancouver students so that we can dedicate more resources to those with additional needs in the classroom. We need to ensure that students who may have additional needs get timely access to a diagnosis and have resources available for early intervention. As someone who was very anxious as a child, I know the importance of school counsellors and early intervention and I thrived because of the additional services I received. Without it, school would have been so much harder. 

Schools are more than the service that students get in the classroom. We also need to think about the physical environment. We need to ensure that all aspects of education are accessible and that includes ensuring that the physical school spaces are accessible to those with disabilities so that they can participate both in the classroom and on the playground. In all of these conversations, we need to center the disability community in shaping an accessibility strategy. 

OneCity Vancouver

Krista Sigurdson

It is incredibly important that Vancouver schools support students with diverse learning needs by making sure that all students are treated with dignity and have their academic, social and emotional needs met. Currently, this is happening for many students with diverse learning needs across the district but many others are falling through the cracks. I will work to ensure that teacher and staff work is not compromised by overcrowding, staffing shortages or classroom composition that contravenes the Supreme Court decision on the number of learning designations allowable per classroom. I will work to make sure there are enough educational assistants in schools, that they are getting enough hours and that they are being paid enough to make their work meaningful and beneficial for diverse students. 

Parents tell me often that the testing of children with special needs has fallen behind in that students are put on lengthy wait lists before they can access testing, the first step to accessing services. I will work with human resources to find appropriate staffing to get testing done to address this long-standing issue.

Students come to school with a number of learning needs that cannot be addressed through individualized education plans (IEPs) such as food insecurity, housing insecurity, English language learning, mental health challenges, the impacts of homophobia/racism/sexism/colonialism and it is part of a school system to address these barriers to learning. I will work to enhance supports for all students experiencing these barriers.

Gavin Somers

I believe that all students have a wide variety of learning needs from a programming and environmental standpoint; that students deserve to see themselves reflected in all aspects of the curriculum and school environment.

‘Diverse learning needs’ could mean students with learning challenges, disabilities, neurodivergence, ranging aptitudes, and varying strengths and challenges. 

‘Diverse learning needs’ could also be interpreted through a social and environmental lens when we consider the range of identities our students carry, for example; 2SLGBTQIA+ students, racialized and newcomer students, or English language learners (to name a few).

Schools should be well resourced and supported to serve a variety of student needs through staffing and programs. As a Trustee, I would advocate at a provincial level for more adequate funding. This funding could provide necessary assessments to students with special designations and ensure that schools have a variety of programming and necessary support for students to thrive.

I believe that youth are incredibly resourceful and resilient, and more often than not, know what they need to thrive. As a Trustee, I would welcome feedback from students around what they feel they and their schools need, and do my best to advocate to remove barriers and seek creative solutions to ensure that students are able to be a part of creating the best possible school environment without shouldering the burden.

Investing in a community where diverse learners can be supported in their individuality, together, is a strength; a microcosm of the larger world we are a part of, from which our school communities can flourish.

Rory Brown

Inclusion forms one of the core motivations of the public education system. I strongly believe that the redistribution of resources and opportunities is what our school system should be doing more of. By focussing, increasing and concentrating efforts to support diverse learners we teach children about what we value in society -- for me this is what equity means. In concrete terms, I would end the current practice of removing supports that Resource Teachers provide (this is currently done to mitigate the teacher and education aide shortage). I would also examine and re-vamp the process of populating choice programs with students -- VSB's current practice decreases opportunities for most learners, ignores current educational trends and aggregates supports in a fashion that restricts access and opportunity. Under the guise of inclusion, many supports for students with profound challenges have been removed at the secondary level. A co-requisite examination of supports for the most able students has not been undertaken. This needs to immediately occur.

Kyla Epstein

Every student should have their learning needs met and I think it is important to start off by saying that teachers and school staff across the district are doing this every day. Thousands of students are getting their learning needs - and also emotional and psychological needs - met, but we need to make sure that every child has this experience in ways that work for them and their families. 

This means advocating for getting more funding and support in place so teachers and staff can support all students effectively. This means the district needs to be resourced for the existing needs of its students. This means that the Supreme Court decision on class size and composition needs to be fully implemented at every school in Vancouver, something we know is not the case today. We need to make sure that we push for more funding to catch up on assessments and testing where we have fallen behind. We need to fight for Educational Assistants (EAs) to be paid a living wage with full-time hours and we need to work with the District’s HR team to find the staffing needed to do this important work.

As I said, we know so many teachers and school staff are doing amazing work every day with kids who have designations and also with kids who have needs that are not covered by designations - including needs that arise due to social determinants of health such as poverty, food insecurity, and lack of adequate housing. Meeting learning needs is also about making sure that wrap-around supports are in place from having food programs, libraries, counsellors, and culturally inclusive and appropriate school spaces and programs. 

Lastly, we need to listen to groups like the BCEdAccess Society and also to students themselves. Kids have education rights - Charter rights and under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child - and we need to listen to them so we can provide effective, holistic, and meaningful support to each kid. And we need to fight to get the funding we need to do it!

Jennifer Reddy

I do not support any reduction of service to students. We are already significantly underfunded and any cuts to classrooms deeply and immediately affect students with diverse learning needs and continue to impact them over their lifetime. As a youth worker, I witnessed the impact that underfunding has on students across the district from kindergarten to adult education. Students with diverse backgrounds including migration, special needs, gaps in education, mental health, discrimination, and other intersecting and compounding identities, face barriers to having their needs adequately assessed and met. I support properly funded classrooms that include teachers and supporting staff who are adequately compensated and supported to work with each student in safe, accessible and updated facilities. I strongly support students and families to have access to decision-making platforms, to share their needs and give their feedback. Furthermore, I support services and programs that help address inequities such as neighbourhood schools where students can walk and roll to school, access food programs, technology, library support, and other learning supports. 

I will work to ensure that we have the appropriate staffing to support each student’s needs and strengths.

COPE

Suzie Mah

In terms of meeting the needs of diverse learners, I believe that our system needs to support and offer a variety of programs and approaches that will give students opportunities to be successful.  Examples of this would be smaller classes, the ability to arrange for both homogenous and heterogenous groupings according to student interest and learning styles, providing opportunities for multi-age learning where students can mentor and learn from one another, incorporating technology where warranted, providing paid in-service for teachers and other staff who work with students to learn how to use the technology, and by continuing to support teachers in developing alternate ways of assessment so students with diverse needs can achieve meaningful feedback and success that is more consistent with their learning needs.

I have always been and will continue to be committed to early identification and support for students with educational challenges and diverse learning needs. Many of Vancouver's students who have learning challenges receive little to no support. If elected, I aim to change this by demanding more funding for special needs supports in the classroom (e.g. more SSAs and Resource Teachers). Also, I would like to see more teacher psychologists so we can identify learning challenges earlier so schools can design education plans to meet the needs of these students. I would also like the district to provide more release time so school staff can meet with each other and parents to design and implement programs so that students are more successful in school both academically, emotionally, and socially.

Green Party of Vancouver

Lois Chan-Pedley

My colleagues will no doubt be focusing on students, since this is a student newspaper… I'll deviate a bit and make a slightly tangential point. Most anything a trustee suggests here will probably get carried out by a teacher, student support worker, principal/VP, or another staff member. Staff need good professional development. Many teachers say that their BEd did not prepare them for real, diverse classrooms. The district does have training available to make sure staff have the skills for supporting students of all needs, but we know from speaking with many students and families there is room to improve. We have access to world-class professors and programs right next door at UBC and SFU, and their knowledge will be very beneficial to the students across the district. Let's build on those relationships and make sure our staff has the resources they need to support students.

Janet Fraser

All children have an inherent curiosity about the world around them, a desire to learn, and the right to a public education that enables each and every student to graduate with dignity, purpose and options. As a district we need to meet children where they are, acknowledging the diversity of learning needs, and that each child will build their learning pathway. While each student is unique, talking with parents, students and staff, and reading about different approaches, fuels my desire to build continuous improvement.

Staff in schools/programs bring this to life every school day and we need to ensure robust supports are in place district-wide, acknowledging the many program options.  As for many school districts, the VSB spends more than the provincial allocation on students with diverse needs, a system could be improved by focusing more on the students’ educational needs.

Nick Poppell

Every student is unique. From how they see themselves, interact with others, and explore the environment that surrounds them, they each have a unique way of learning and the right to an education system that meets them where they are. I’ve seen up close what the impact can be on student success from dedicated staff and teachers who do just that. 

My mom has worked in the school system for decades and growing up she had a very difficult upbringing. Her fridge at home is proudly adorned with so many bright and happy students during their graduations. Some of those students also came from difficult backgrounds. I’ve heard so many stories, so many closed doors that swung open with new opportunities. My mom was the type of person who could see where these students were at and connect with them on their terms using experiences from her past. I look forward to seeing which new faces will be on her fridge next time I visit. 

As a district, we need to ensure we are meeting students' unique educational needs, on the level that best leads to their success in graduating, with a plethora of options and opportunities awaiting them. Trustees, staff, teachers, and parents must continue to collaborate with each other, and continue to explore and incorporate new and innovative ways to meet students' diverse learning requirements. 

Candidates with no response

The Non-Partisan Association has yet to announce candidates, and did not respond to multiple inquiries as to whether they will be participating in this series and when candidates can be expected. COPE candidate Rocco Trigueros also did not respond to this week’s questionnaire.