What would you do with 40 million dollars?
It would be a great problem to solve. Most of us would consider 40 million dollars a significant amount of money.
This is the amount of potential “savings” our Education Minister spoke about when he announced the introduction of Bill 64 – The Education Modernization Act. By putting in place a new governance structure, the education system would “save” 40 million dollars. Subsequently, we find that the Minister’s definition of “savings” is not how many of us think of “savings”.
Generally, when we “save money” it means we do not spend it. We set it aside for a “rainy day” or we use it at a later date for a specific project. However, that is not how this 40 million dollar “savings” is being discussed.
When asked about this money, the Minister identified that it will be used to support the front lines in education – being able to add more teachers, educational assistants, clinicians, etc.
In other words, the 40 million dollar “savings” will be spent in other areas. It is not “saved” to help balance the Provincial budget, for example, but spent – albeit in different ways.
Fair enough.
Certainly, an additional 40 million dollars to the education system would be greatly appreciated. It would allow school divisions to maintain current programs, staffing levels and services to schools. It would also enable school boards to forego some of the cuts that have taken place to balance their budgets.
Wait…school boards will not be able to make the decisions on where this additional 40 million dollars will be spent, if Bill 64 passes. There will be one board that will determine how this additional 40 million dollars will be re-invested.
It seems like a lot of money. However, context always matters.
The Education budget in Manitoba is roughly 2.5 billion dollars annually. It is the second largest portfolio in the Province behind the Health budget. What does 40 million dollars equate to? Here are a few examples:
- It is about 1.5 million dollars short of Mountain View School Division’s annual budget.
- It is 10 times smaller than the annual budget for Manitoba’s largest School Division – Winnipeg School Division.
- It is about the amount used to employ bus drivers annually to transport students to school in Manitoba, and not enough to cover the utility bill for Manitoba’s schools.
- It is half the total administrative budget for all school divisions in the province, which is 3.3%.
- It is 10 times more than the total remuneration for all trustees combined in our province.
- If sent to schools, it would mean every school in Manitoba, approximately 690, would receive an additional $58,000.
It is still a lot of money.
But in the context of public education, it does not make as great an impact as it sounds. It works out to about 1.6% of the annual provincial education budget.
It does sound impressive. But consider this: it comes from revamping the entire governance structure of education and centralizing decision making. It assumes that after factoring in the additional costs of Bill 64 and the transition expenses, you will be left with 40 million dollars to reallocate.
Bill 64 restructures the system and adds increased financial responsibilities to schools with the potential for additional financial managers in each school or group of schools. It calls for greater responsibilities for parents and identifies employing someone to work with each school community council. It means establishing regional offices with yet to be determined staff levels. It establishes a new centralized school board – the Provincial Education Authority – that will govern the system with appointed board members. The belief is that this will free up 40 million dollars. A belief, because there is no evidence it will, in fact, do just that.
Even if it does…
How much of these 40 million dollars will go directly to schools? Will it mean each school with have an extra teacher – an entry level one, mind you? Will it mean 1 or 1.5 educational assistant positions will be added to each building? Will it mean additional services in each school or will it go to where it is most needed, the definition of which will occur by the government-appointed members of the Provincial Education Authority? Will it mean that some schools will receive more resources and staff and others will not? Will all schools be treated the same?
Forty million dollars is a lot of money. But is it worth what Bill 64 proposes? It is important that Manitobans weigh in on what our current government envisions education will look like. After all, that 40 million dollars… it comes from all of us.