The Big Picture

'The Big Picture' is how Colleen described our day today (we certainly took enough of them!) While it might also have been viewed as 'taking in the sights' of Calgary, it certainly did help us understand more of the history and culture of the city and province.

Colleen was a wonderful guide as our walking tour took in: City Hall, Olympic Plaza, Stephen Avenue Mall, Calgary Tower (where we had lunch in the revolving restaurant) with views over the Stampede Grounds and Glenbow Museum.

We left home at 8am and have returned at 11pm with light snow falling. The reason for our late arrival is that, again with Colleen's assistance, we were able to secure 3 seats to the sold out Calgary Flames v Winnipeg Jets Ice Hockey game. Despite our team's narrow loss we had a wonderful time and found it very exciting to watch. The only trouble was we were thinking it odd when people started leaving in the 'third quarter'......Ice Hockey is played over 3 x 20 minute periods...so there was no fourth quarter!

Tomorrow is our weekend trip to Banff and Lake Louise - more snow is forecast so the scenery should be spectacular.

Calgary Schooling: Some interesting facts shared by Colleen

CALGARY SCHOOLING

- Different strands of completion to high school - High School Diploma and Certificate of Completion.
Certificate of Completion is different to the diploma. Is for students wanting/ needing to complete school ready for employment.
-Four classes a day at 90 minutes each.

-Mobile phones are used in some schools as an education tool. No diaries - instead they use 'agendas' on their phone to keep a record of homework etc.
It's how they teach them responsibility and social citizenship. See this as important. However, it has increased teacher workload and they have to work hard to manage the way they are used.

-Some schools have a Knowledge and Employability program - this is a pathway for students who have a lower IQ (under 80).

Calgary Education Motto - Every school is for every student. Calgary Board of Education - governs schools across different regions in the city.

227 schools are governed by the Calgary Board of Education. This includes schools for K-4, K-6, 4-9, 10-12, boys, girls, science, tech, pregnant teens etc. There are also classroom in unique settings such as one in the Board of Education, which is booked out everyday.

Board of Trustees are elected for each district. They then determine the Chief Superintendent (who is responsible for 10000 employees).

Spanish is the most popular language taught in schools, followed by Mandarin.

Teachers are only paid for 10 months but the money is divided across 12 months.
After 10 years no more pay increases.
Assistant Principal - earns just over 100,000 dollars.

Under Assistant Principals they have Learning Leaders e.g Maths. They only earn 200 dollars more than teachers a month and may get less teaching time. Don't have the same responsibilities!! e.g Don't run PD, observations or write curriculum.

No Deputy Principals just Principal and APs

Zoning occurs but the zones ensure they incorporate all different levels of society and availability of housing to meet those needs. This makes schools more equitable.

University of Lethbridge - is their best teaching education facility.

Provincially set education (curriculum to be taught in the province)  - Alberta Education website - lots of resources on Alberta curriculum. No national curriculum, but the western provinces are similar.

The following links provide an overview of the Calgary Board of Education and the Alberta Education System.

http://www.cbe.ab.ca

https://education.alberta.ca/

Introducing Our Host Colleen Bratko

We had a smooth run in to the city and Colleen was waiting to greet us, with a 'Welcome Loxton Teachers' sign. Instantly we knew we were in good hands from her positive and friendly manner - not to mention the freshly brewed pot of coffee! 

Colleen has many qualifications and skills: Bachelor of Education, Bachelor of Arts, Registered Psychologist, First Nation teacher and also a stint as an Assistant Principal.

In our first session Colleen provided background information on Calgary. Did you know the city is built / runs on oil and gas? Hence it is a very wealthy place, with more engineers here than anywhere else in Canada. This has an impact on parental expectations. Yes, the Calgary Stampede is famous and there are plenty of ranchers but the oil/gas employment was 'news' to us.

Alberta offers an International Youth Leadership Summit each year. The CBE also have an educational relationship with China, Columbia as well as Australia.

Morning Preparations

We are feeling refreshed and keen to start our official day of business. Hopefully, all of our driving yesterday will meam we go straight to the Calgary Board of Education today!

Well done to all of our athletes yesterday - finishing 3rd in the state is commendable -  and our 'Bamboo' pole vaulter won the U15 Boys and gained a standard! We might have to stock up on bamboo for next year!

It's the last day of school back home, the end of term assembly and I'm disappointed to be missing out on The Barbershop Boys. My Year 12s will be loading up their homework to keep them busy for the next 2 weeks. Just hoping they have made the effort to read my blog, that's why I thought I'd better give them a special mention!

Feeling a little bit nervous but also excited to meet Colleen Bratko this morning. The fact that we are representing Loxton High School, South Australia....Australian Education!!!

Can't wait to have something 'real' to report.

Circumnavigating Calgary

We thought we should do a practice run to make sure we knew how to get in to The Calgary Board Of Education for a 9am start tomorrow.

We left Tara at home to rest and Skye was in charge of the GPS.  Our destination was 8th Street SW (sounds very specific, don't you think?! Wrong!)

After a 35 km drive in one direction (cows and rolled hay), 35 km in another direction (suburban housing), we admitted defeat and found a couple of locals to help us out, using the postcode to pinpoint the target. Finally we headed in to the heart of the city and feel confident about tomorrow. We can't travel all this way and be late for our first appointment!

Early to bed for us all.

Our Calgary Home

 We have arrived safely, collected our VW Passat and driven to our new home. Snowflakes were lightly falling as we drove into our street. We are all feeling pretty pleased with ourselves and looking forward to settling in and stretching out!

Good Luck Loxton

Here we are sitting in Vancouver airport waiting to board our connecting flight to Calgary....but our thoughts are with our Athletics team who will compete against the best schools in SA in the A1 Track & Field Championships. Conditions may be wet but we trust that the team will do their best.

It's so good Robbie Seiboth is able to attend the meet, a fitting reward for all of his efforts in preparing our track year in and year out!

Best wishes to our pole vaulters, using bamboo poles for pre-training could be a secret weapon!

Snow capped mountains and spectacular coastline, so different to home!

We are Loxton High ( even so far away!)