GPPSD Trustee Election Candidate Profile: Chris Johnston

2. What skills or experience do you have that you feel would make you a good fit for the role?

My engineering background in R&D brings analytical, evidence-based thinking to the board. I make thoughtful decisions rather than reacting to political hot-button issues or short-term problems. I enjoy analyzing data to understand what it tells us, and I’ve helped develop new metrics that better reflect our performance as a school system. What surprised me most as a new trustee was how evidence-based our division already was, which I believe is a testament to our strong administration team and a culture of continuous improvement.

3. What do you feel are the key or main election issues in your community, and what are the issues of priority for you?

I’ve seen three main issues dominate current discussions.

First, a chronic underfunding of public education is creating outcomes families don’t like, such as large class sizes and insufficient classroom supports like EAs. The biggest needed change is increased base per-pupil funding from the province, which hasn’t increased in about 10 years. Most increases come from short-term grants, making long-term planning impossible. Alberta students receive the lowest per-student funding in Canada, which limits the supports we can provide.

Second, transparency into how our public education system is managed. I think our division is more transparent than people sometimes realize! Our website contains extensive information, including annual budgets (publicly audited), three-year education plans, annual results reports, meeting minutes, and YouTube recordings of our meetings. Only 3% of our budget goes to governance and administration, which is a specific government grant we can’t exceed. I believe there are a lot of resources that exist for parent and stakeholder engagement, and we are always happy to answer questions if anything seems wrong.

Unfortunately, I believe that both of these issues have been overshadowed by a third, which is socially divisive wedge issues that drive parents and teachers apart. Media magnification of these relatively minor issues undermines public school confidence and usually ends up with students caught in the crossfire. These politically charged issues affect very few students, but generate a lot of online arguments while crucial funding issues that affect every student every day get sidelined.

I believe that Grande Prairie Public has navigated these challenges well during multiple years of fast growth during my first term (12% enrollment growth in four years). We’ve improved our 3-year and 5-year graduation rates by about five percentage points each over the last four years. Indigenous student achievement has improved to meet or exceed provincial averages, and parent satisfaction with our supports is very high (92% overall parent satisfaction). After multiple years of advocacy, we also finally saw a change to the provincial funding model this year, which doesn’t lag funding behind population growth as badly as the previous weighted moving average.

I want to continue representing families as we advocate for the supports our kids need, and will ensure we maintain focus on our most important challenges.

4. Where can people learn more about you?

I’m active online during election season at: https://www.facebook.com/ChrisJohnston4GPPSD

I’ve been doing a lot of posts recently which have deep dives into some topics like public education funding, inclusive education, recruitment and retention of teachers, and class sizes. If you’d like to learn more about these issues and how they affect Grande Prairie Public (or the strategies we use to handle them) then you should take a look!

by Tanner Smith