Reinstate Visually Impaired and Hospital Homebound Teachers
Motion 7 · Special Board Meeting, April 20, 2026
Summary
- Sought to reinstate 1.0 FTE teacher of the visually impaired and 1.0 FTE hospital homebound teacher, both proposed for reduction in the draft budget; cost of $280,778 from operating contingency.
- Supporters raised concerns about losing a rare specialist position that took a year to fill, and about leaving only one teacher to cover all hospital homebound students district-wide.
- Staff noted enrollment in both programs has declined and stabilized; current caseloads of approximately 14 students each are manageable with the reduced complement, and provincial resource programs provide additional hospital support.
- The chair noted that fiscal responsibility requires aligning staffing to current enrollment rather than retaining unfilled-need positions.
Vote
Public comments
Read all 2 statements
Transcript
17 segments
As a point of procedure, I'm going to ask that we make an amendment to include the dollar value as I missed that previously. And I appreciate your patience. So I'm going to ask the secretary treasurer to add that into the motion that we currently see on the screen to accommodate for the budget allocation. And I'm looking to see if there's a seconder who would support me.
Okay, if there's no objection, it's approved by consensus. Thank you. That's a better way to do it.
Thank you. Okay, so the motion reads... that the VSB 2026-27 budget fund the provision of teachers on call to replace absent resource teachers on their first day of absence. And that this funding of 2.697552 million will come from a reduction in the divisional superintendent and divisional superintendent office budgets and other areas in the budget that do not affect direct instruction to students. Okay. Seeing no other comments, we're going to go to a vote. All those in favor?
Trustee Ma and Trustee Reddy, those opposed? Trustees Richardson, Chan, Freedcoat, Chan, Pedley, Fraser and Young. Okay, the motion is defeated and we'll go to agenda item 2.2.6. Trustee Ma, will you please read your motion?
Thank you, staff. You are quick. We appreciate you very much. Kate, would you mind reading your...
Yes, thank you, Chair. So I would move that the board amend the 2026-2027 draft financial plan and budget to reinstate 1.0 FTE teacher of the visually impaired staffing and 1.0 FTE hospital homebound teacher staffing for the 2026-2027 school year and that the board approve the allocation of 280,778 from the operating contingency to fund the additional 2.0 FTE teacher staffing.
Is there a seconder? Trustee Reddy, Trustee Ma, please give us your rationale.
All right, so the decrease of the 1.0 FTE visually impaired teacher who works at the district level will result in leaving two teachers to provide service to the entire district. This service is highly specialized and it will be extremely difficult to recruit this position in the future should support needs increase. The position took a whole year to fill and this indicates that the scarcity of these types of teaching professionals in BC. The teacher of the visually impaired not only directly support students with just visual impairments, but works with other school staff and parents to ensure that the student programs are met with continuity without specialized support. In addition, if service needs go up due to newly designated visually impaired students, it's doubtful that we would be able to find a TTOC to temporarily help with the increased workload. So this is sort of mirroring what the last rationale with, you know, like we have people in our district that provide highly specialized service, it's extremely difficult to find these people and it's also difficult to retain these people. And so if we lose this visually impaired, visually impaired teacher, that doesn't sound right, does it? Teacher of the visually impaired, that would have a detrimental effect on the students that need the support. The second part of this is the decrease of 1.0 FTE to the hospital homebound teacher, which would leave one teacher for the entire district to support students who are ill, who may be in a hospital, who may be too ill to attend, physically attend school or mentally to attend school. And I know that in the draft budget, there was an explanation that maybe VLN, the Vancouver Learning Network Program, would provide this service. They are an online school and some of the students that would be needing this hospital homebound service may not even be able to sit up and access a laptop or use technology to access their coursework. To leave the district with one teacher to service both elementary and secondary would lead to an overall teacher workload and also possibly compromising the type of service that we provide to these extremely vulnerable. I mean, I think that's sort of the mantra or the theme of this budget is we are negatively affecting the most vulnerable students in our district. We need to stop doing this.
May I ask a question to staff with regard to if there has been a decline in why this move was made to have this motion be brought to the board? Alison Ogden, thank you.
Thank you through the chair. As part of our yearly ongoing work, we are looking at enrollment patterns and we're seeing a decline in the number of students using these teachers for support. So looking forward and doing projections into the future, we will have 14 students in the district who will require support from a resource teacher, a vision resource teacher. This year we had four, sorry, also 14 students who are accessing the services of our two hospital homebound teachers. And that pattern has been something that's been stable the last couple of years. And our provincial resource programs that provide teachers within our hospital programs do provide educational support for students in hospital in all of the various wards at Children's.
Thank you for that. Are there any questions from trustees? I see Trustee Freedcoat, Trustee Fraser, and then, okay, we'll go to you first, Trustee Freedcoat.
Okay. Thank you, Chair. I have a question to the staff that we had 14 students and we had two full-time hospital homebound teacher allocated for that. If we're reducing one, would that not, or impact the services that we're providing to these students?
Thanks through the chair. We are seeing a decline in the number of students accessing hospital homebound. So this year was it was an again a decline that we didn't anticipate for that. I would also say that the this is ratioed staffing as part of our collective agreement. So this staffing will actually be going to support students in schools so a greater number of students. So it will go in as resource teacher time in our schools.
Trustee Fraser, you're up next.
Thank you. My question's been answered.
Wonderful. We'll go to Trustee Reddy next.
Thanks, Chair, and thanks to Trustee Ma for raising this. I'm glad to be able to discuss how important it is to offer these kinds of services for kids who do fall ill. So my understanding is that the placement and kind of offer of this support is what's critical for the unforeseeable circumstances and that these positions create some sense of normalcy and bridging back for kids. And I've seen this program in action from K to 12. So I think that it would be important for us to continue to offer the support because it isn't easy to anticipate when children will fall ill and need this kind of support. So it would be incumbent on us to offer it. so that it is available should a student need it. Thank you.
Okay, seeing no other hands up, I'll make a quick comment. I think we need to live in a reality and make choices in reality. And if we don't have a lot of funds to do, to provide adequate services, then we shouldn't be spending it on services that we don't have students for. So I will not be supporting this as we just heard from staff that all students are being accommodated and provided with adequate resourcing for what we've heard. I'm going to ask that it be closed now and then go to a vote.
Thank you. I think it's important to recognize that these positions, particularly the teacher of the visually impaired is a highly specialized position. The board always has the option if there is a teacher for a particular program or a school for that matter, if they are not needed, that they could be reassigned. And I am very concerned that if we whittle it down from three to two, that we will lose that person. And we may not be able to find that a person to fulfill that role for a very long time.
Statement Watch
Thank you very much, Chair. And I'm going to pass it over to Patricia McNeil, Director, to give you an update on the engagement. Thank you. Thank you. The engagement summary report included in this evening's package and posted to our website outlines input we received to assist in the board's consideration of the 2026-2027 financial plan. Engagement activities were grounded in our education plan, the framework for enhancing student learning, and follow best practice standards by the International Association of Public Participation, or IAB2. Input was sought from inherent rights holders, stakeholder groups, students, families, staff, and the broader public through a mix of methods and activities. The engagement period was open from January 12th to April 16th and included multiple opportunities such as meetings, workshops, and discussions with inherent rights holders and former stakeholder groups, as well as written submissions to the board, an online survey, which was available publicly and to staff, as well as students, and last week's Committee of the Whole meeting and public delegation meeting. Trustees received a copy of all written submissions on a weekly basis, as well as a copy of survey responses in early March. An interim summary report was available that first week of March as well. The report in your package this evening is an update to that interim report to include information about input and feedback received since early March. Across engagement activities, participants highlighted priorities related to classroom staffing and supports, a focus on student learning and course offerings, as well as schedules, learning resources, student wellbeing and mental health, inclusion and equity, facilities and school or learning environments, as well as supports to student families. It's important to note that priorities raised through this year's engagement reflect patterns that we've heard through previous year's financial planning, and I would be pleased to take any questions trustees may have.
Statement Watch
ELLIE WILSON- Thanks for the question through the chair. Our resource teachers in schools provide a variety of services. I think sort of to your question, they're responding to every student's individual education plan, and those vary across the needs of all students. So there would be small group work, there's push-in support that happen in classrooms, and it's all directed by a student's individual education plan. So those folks coming into our schools would need to familiarize themselves with those individual education plans and get up to speed about how to implement that. Certainly our school-based resource teachers could leave weekly, I would say, detailed plans about how they're working with students, but those would be constantly evolving plans. And I think... A lot of our folks who are sick for a day or two don't necessarily have those very detailed, detailed plans that would provide guidance to somebody. Certainly someone who's gonna be away could prepare that to support the work.
Do you have a follow-up? Go ahead.
Thank you. So if a teacher is absent, a resource teacher is absent and there is a TTOC in place for that, they won't have the full information of those particular cases for those students. Is that correct?
Through the chair, that is correct. They would have to take a bit of time to learn how to do that.