(File photo/paNOW Staff)

By Dawson Thompson

Provincial Funding

Schools funding to help mental health and youth literacy

Aug 11, 2021 | 4:00 PM

The Government of Saskatchewan has provided school districts across the province an extra $21 million dollars to fund programs as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Saskatchewan Rivers Public School Division and the Prince Albert Roman Catholic Separate School Division both say the funding will be used towards staffing youth literacy programs and will be used to provide mental health resources to students in the aftermath of the pandemic.

The funding will focus on three key priorities; additional reading supports for grade one to five students, supportive learning opportunities for students whose education may have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and mental health supports for students and staff as they return from a challenging year.

Prince Albert Roman Catholic Separate School Division

The funding will be in-line with what the school division is already putting in works towards, according to director of education, Lorel Trumier.

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“There was an extension of those same goals over the last year,” Trumier said. “Our school division has a priority action plan around supporting mental health and well-being and we have a priority action plan specific to learning responses, especially in the area of reading and literacy focus.”

Over the past year the division has talked to staff and parents about these action plans and better ways to support the students.

“We’re looking forward to hitting the ground running and work on the different aspects of the plan,” Trumier added. “Teaching children how to read is so critical and we really wanted to put a focus on that in the year ahead.”

Saskatchewan Rivers Public School Division

Due to retirements, resignation, and staff moving to different school divisions, the Sask. Rivers School Division will be losing 25 staff for the upcoming year.

This funding will go towards staffing in the school division and a few hires will be made.

“It goes almost entirely into staffing,” Robert Bratvold, Director of Education told paNOW. “For mental health supports, we have been able to increase our social worker positions.”

The funding will be allocated to support teachers who focus on grade one to three reading and educational assistants.

“They will be additional to what we had previously planned,” Bratvold said. “Some of them will be teachers who have been with us for years and are assigned to a new position, others might be actual new hires.”

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Dawson.thompson@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @dawsonthompson8