A draft meeting schedule for the coming year has been laid out for Gulf Islands School District (SD64) Board of Education members — and starting in September, for the first time, the regular meetings will be streamed live online to members of the public.
Board meetings have always been open for the public to attend in-person, and trustees and school officials have — from time to time — “zoomed in” for meetings when they could not be there. But while technology costs and privacy considerations had made board members reluctant to provide live video in the past, the news will be welcome for many Gulf Islanders — particularly since the current draft schedule puts all meetings for the coming academic year at the district’s board room facility on Salt Spring Island.
“It’s all here at the school board office,” said SD64 board president Tisha Boulter at the June 12 board meeting. “Our connections to the outer islands will be during our committee meetings.”
Those committee meetings will continue to be held on other islands — including Saturna, Galiano, Pender and Mayne islands — as well as online. The regular board meetings will be held the second Wednesday of each month September through June, excluding October, December and March.
While the public may not spontaneously participate in trustees’ regular meetings — they are “open to the public for observation” while board members conduct business — they will include a question period at the end of the meeting. Boulter said that during live streams, the current plan was not to record “the back of the room, and all the guests,” focusing on just keeping the stream aimed at board members “for privacy reasons.”
“We don’t want to implicate a person who [simply] comes to a board meeting being seen live streamed,” said Boulter.
The first meeting after the summer break will be Wednesday, Sept. 11.
Strategic plan input
Also at the meeting, trustees and staff noted that Sunday, June 23 is the final day for people to provide input on the district’s strategic plan.
Four plan focus areas are proposed: Truths, Reparation and Restoration; Integrity and Responsibility; Relationships and Belonging; An Ethic of Learning.
The feedback form can be found on the district’s sd64.bc.ca website.