The Canadian School Boards Association Board of Directors is excited to welcome Janet Stewart as the new Executive Director. Janet will work with Nancy Pynch-Worthylake to transition into the role this summer. Nancy will officially wrap up her time with CSBA in August.
Janet’s experience as a classroom teacher, school administrator, senior school district administrator, and chief operating officer of the BC Public School Employers’ Association, provides her with a wealth of expertise in working with school boards as they carry out their mandates as the locally elected governors of public education. We are looking forward to working with Janet, and would like to thank Nancy for her significant contributions and expertise to the CSBA over the last seven years.
As you are aware by now, the Manitoba School Boards Association, as host of the 2025 CSBA Congress and National Trustee Gathering on Indigenous Education in Winnipeg, has made the important decision to shift this year’s event to fully online format in response to the Manitoba Government’s call for a reduction of non-essential travel to Manitoba while our province continues to battle out of control wildfires and seek temporary housing in hotels for over 21000 evacuees. We look forward to providing a fantastic two-day online learning opportunity, with many of the keynote speakers and professional development opportunities from the original in-person program. Visit www.winnipeg2025.ca to learn more.
At our meeting in February, the CSBA Board of Directors engaged in a valuable self-evaluation to assess our individual and collective efficacy as members of a diverse national team. This best practice for highfunctioning boards is an important exercise for all to do from time to time, and we encourage our member associations and their member boards to do the same. The board reviewed the results at the May meeting and is using the feedback to continue effective collaboration on behalf of schoolboards throughout the country. Both the evaluation itself and the candid discussion around its results, serve to reinforce my strong sense of pride as the leader of this fantastic group.
In April the CSBA sent a strong delegation to the National School Boards Association Annual Conference in Atlanta, Georgia, where I had the privilege of once again this year, addressing the General Assembly as the President of CSBA – the longstanding international partner of the NSBA. With the significant challenges facing the American public education system and the state of the relationship between the leaders of our two sovereign nations, especially in early spring of this year, it was an important opportunity for us to bring a message of friendship, respect, empathy and collaboration to our fellow school board members in the United States.
My colleagues from around the CSBA table will agree, that we were welcomed with open arms by our neighbours to the south, both in the enthusiastic response to my address to the General Assembly, but also through the impromptu greetings in the halls of the convention centre and the strong attendance and engagement at our CSBA PD session on the work of school boards in Canada.
Planning is well underway for our 2025 advocacy event in October in Ottawa. This annual event has increasingly helped the CSBA build important relationships with partners in the federal government. While public education is a provincial and territorial government responsibility, there are many Members of Parliament, Senators, Ministers, and senior civil servants who are interested in youth and education. Each year the CSBA Board of Directors sets priority areas to guide discussions and develop materials to support our work on Parliament Hill. Discussions are ongoing to refine these topics for the 2025 event, and we look forward to once again bringing the voice of school boards to Ottawa in the fall.
Regards,
Alan Campbell, President