The Bulkley Valley Teachers Union isn’t taking the latest Provincial elementary school rankings to heart.
Every year, the Fraser Institute ranks BC schools on their provincial “Foundation Skills Assessment” marks.
While it’s one way to measure, BVTU President Ilona Weiss believes a 3-hour test isn’t an accurate representation of any school.
“This is a very narrow snapshot. It’s one test that’s given to students and then it ranks schools across the province. It’s really an unfair measure of what’s going on in the classroom,” she says.
She adds the test leaves out socio-economic factors and believes it’s “culturally biased.” If you want to know how good your child’s school is, she recommends going in and seeing for yourself.
“The teachers in the Bulkley Valley are all fantastic, I mean, there’s just no getting away from that. So, if parents spend some time in schools they’ll see all the wonderful things that are happening in schools. They shouldn’t just look at this assessment.”
Of the 944 schools ranked, nine are in the Bulkley Valley and Lakes on the list. Ebenezer Canadian Reformed School (52nd, scored 9.0) was ranked the highest, followed by St. Joseph’s (62 / 8.8), Muheim Memorial (120 / 7.5), Walnut Park (280 / 6.1), Bulkley Valley Christian (280 / 6.8), Silverthorne (297 / 6.7), Twain Sullivan (404 / 6.2), Decker Lake (929 / 1.6), and William Konkin (939 / 0.0).
High school rankings will come out later in the year. There were no schools from the Hazeltons or Telkwa on the list.
Something going on in the Bulkley Valley Lakes District you think people should know about?
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