Engagement is a process that brings education partners together to participate in a cycle of continuous improvement to bring about positive change.
We bring our education partners together throughout the year, approximately every six weeks, for our Education Committee of the Whole. The committee is made up of members of our senior team, Kootenay Lake Teachers’ Association (KLTF), CUPE 748, our Kootenay Lake Principals’ and Vice-Principals’ Association (KLPVPA), our District Parent Advisory Council (DPAC), our school Parent Advisory Councils (PACs), our Student Trustees, and various members of our exempt staff.
We continue to engage Indigenous communities through the Aboriginal Committee of Education (ACE), inviting voices to the table to support Indigenous student success. During 2020/2021, we held individualized council meetings.
We continue to focus on equity, diversity, inclusion and Indigenization through all professional development and events. For example, the Aboriginal department held cultural learning events including Metis Awareness Month, Residential School Awareness and district wide acknowledgement of Orange Shirt Day, Moosehide Campaign and lessons on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG), a district wide Reconciliation Run inspired by local Chief Jason Louie’s teachings: “to walk with long strides - to take big steps”, a Cultural Camp with traditional and contemporary Indigenous teachings and a virtual week long Pow Wow with over 11,000 participants.
School District 8 Kootenay Lake continues to work with marginalized and contextualized communities such as the Bountiful community in the Creston Valley.
School District 8 Kootenay Lake works together with education and community partners, to support student learning. Relationships are most important to engagement. We know we maximize student success when we maximize our relationships in a positive way. At School District 8 - Kootenay Lake, we focus on our students, first. Next, our relationships extend to families, teachers, support staff, our Indigenous partners, villages, towns, cities, mayors and councils, the Regional District of Central Kootenay (RDCK), and our extended Kootenay Boundary Region including School Districts 5, 6, 10, 20, 51.
We have continued to develop our relationships with post-secondary institutions across the province and country. By doing so we have redirected attention to post-secondary transitions for our students. We do foster a special relationship with those closest to us: Selkirk College, College of the Rockies, Thompson Rivers University, Okanagan College, and the University of British Columbia (UBC) – West Kootenay Teacher Education Program (WKTEP).
In addition, we monitor engagement and participation of our Board of Education, Student Trustees, Parent Advisory Committees (PACs) and District Parent Advisory Committee (DPAC), and through further public consultation around the budget, which includes all partners in education.
