The two school divisions - a provincial and First Nations - are finalizing the details to apply for a provincial grant that would see grant funds over three years through the Building Collaboration in Education.
The grant would benefit First Nations students and educators.
If approved, the divisions will look to begin programing this school year (2015-16).
“We are in the final stages of working collaboratively with the Stoney Education Authority to outline to the government in the grant what our proposal will look like,” said CRPS Superintendent Chris MacPhee.
Alberta put $20 million towards school divisions to work together with bordering First Nation communities.
CRPS has approximately 200 off-reservation First Nation students attending its schools and would receive $335 per student annually for the three years.
SEA has approximately 1,100 students in its division and operates schools such as Morley Community School.
The First Nations division would receive $50,000 and an annual $335 dollars per student over the three-year deal.
“We’ re quite excited about the benefits this would have for not only our own students, but also our First Nation students as well, and staff,” said MacPhee.
Between students and teachers, professional learning opportunities and shared learning opportunities would be presented. Collaborative efforts also include roundtable discussions and processes to increase communication and collaboration, among others.
“Before this grant became public to us we had started making moves to collaborate more closely with SEA because of the number of Stoney First Nation students in our schools.”
Simon Bird, SEA superintendent, said the division is underfunded at about 30 per cent from provincial schools, and would welcome more resources offered through the grant.
“We’ re trying to make sure that we share and collaborate on the common issues that we have to work together,” said Bird. “We don’ t want students to be confused one week over the next and we want to make sure everyone is comfortable with the collaborations we do.
“A lot of this is following the provincial government’ s priority to close the gap in education and there’ s so many aspects of that gap that financial resources is just one part of it.”
