Aside from floating the idea of a K-14 education system, it looks like Advanced Ed Minister Dave Hancock is setting up a leadership website here (it also has a better picture than this one).
Also, for those of you who haven't yet checked it out, Nicole Martel is running for the Federal Liberal nomination in Edmonton East and has set up a website with a cool blog (some you may know of Nicole from her former blog: GoPolitical.ca - which is now automatically linked to her new site). Currently, Nicole is running unopposed for the nomination, but rumours are floating around that Dan McLennan, President of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees, and potentally former Edmonton Mayor Jan Reimer (Mayor from 1989 to 1995) may take a run for the Liberal nomination in Edmonton East.
So far in Edmonton East, the Tories have renominated the wanna-be President of Turks & Caicos, Peter Goldring, and the ND's have nominated former coordinator for the Alberta Council of Women's Shelters, Arlene Chapman.
We've known Nicole for a number of years and can definitely say with extreme confidence that she will make a great candidate come the next Federal election.
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Reimer would be great in opposition.I'd hate to see her in any governmnet portfolio. just remember how many businesses she drove to Calgary when she was mayor.
ReplyDeleteHey Dave.
ReplyDeleteHow does it feel knowing that you paid 20 grand in tuition and that everyone graduating after you is going to pay half that if Hancock gets his way?
Feels good, eh?
Gee, I bet all those parents who are sending kids to school in the next couple of years will reciprocate with votes!
"How does it feel knowing that you paid 20 grand in tuition and that everyone graduating after you is going to pay half that if Hancock gets his way?"
ReplyDeleteThough we do like the idea of K-14, it doesn't do anything to stop the uni from jacking up the last two years to $10,000 a peice to make up the shortfall. The Devil is in the Details.
Good point.
ReplyDeleteI guess the devilish details would have to be worked out, because as you said, it's still just in the ideas phase. Hopefully there is a way to add public input into this rather than just going along for the ride as is often the case.
From the inner circle of post secondary hell:
ReplyDeleteWe seem to be receiving a very high volume of complaints from recent post secondary grads regarding the two years of free tuition idea. Minister Hancock has to answer all of the letters he receives from disgruntled grads, so we should be starting to dig ourselves out of this paper avalanche with rather large shovels in the immediate future.
I'm not sure how I feel about this - I'm no longer in school, so I won't benefit; but, I wouldn't wish my student loan on my worst enemy (ok, maybe my worst enemy). As well, who knows what the long term fiscal implications could be. As Dave said, the devil is in the details. But awesome blog Dave. I check stuff out here before "current events" at work - this is way more entertaining and informative.
By the way complaints/inquiries regarding the K-14 issue can be forwarded to alearningalberta@gov.ab.ca. Just in case you want someone to have to do something.
What about those of us who didn't need to take out a student loan? If student loan relief is part of the equation (just saying speculatively here), can I get some kind of a rebate for being a "fiscally responsible" student?
ReplyDeleteSorry, for anyone that's interested in having their thoughts forwarded to the steering committee that handles Advanced Ed. issues the email address is:
ReplyDeletealearning.alberta@gov.ab.ca
Very interesting, GG (and thanks for the complements... we try :-P ).
ReplyDeleteIt's quite obvious that the student debt situation is very much out of control in Alberta and across Canada. We also find it quite disturbing that Hancock was quoted as saying that a $20,000 student debt wasn't unreasonable...
and yes, we are very very familiar with the A Learning Alberta committee. Unfortunately, we're going to plead the fifth on that one... but, anyone interested in seeing some more ideas on PSE on an ALA submission should check out this document.
"What about those of us who didn't need to take out a student loan? If student loan relief is part of the equation (just saying speculatively here), can I get some kind of a rebate for being a "fiscally responsible" student?"
ReplyDeleteWe'll just have to see if Hancock comes up with some idea about student loan relief. The problem with dealing with public student loans in Alberta is that it's split 60/40 between the Canada STudent Loan Program and Alberta Student Loan Program. So realistically, and deal that would have and effect on more than 40% of someone's student loan would have to include some sort of agreement with the feds. But the 40% is still a huge chunk.
To be fair, we don't think 'fiscal responsibility' has much to do with it. We for example have had to pay for our PSE on our own, while living on our own. We don't make a huge amount of money, so we've had to depend on student loans to pay our tuition fees. It's not that we're not fiscally responsible, it's just that we forgot to plant that money tree in our back yard. ;-)
The comments pouring into our office right now are all hitting the Loan relief button. It's nice to hear from the people that this actually effects (current and former students), rather than having to read an internal memo (which is essentially an effort at mass brainwashing). ; )
ReplyDelete"To be fair, we don't think 'fiscal responsibility' has much to do with it. We for example have had to pay for our PSE on our own, while living on our own. We don't make a huge amount of money, so we've had to depend on student loans to pay our tuition fees. It's not that we're not fiscally responsible, it's just that we forgot to plant that money tree in our back yard. ;-)"
ReplyDeleteAlso to be fair, I was being an ass. :P I don't mean to imply that a student with a $20,000 debtload is "fiscally irresponsible", I just meant to chide the government with some of their own language.
no prob, dude. we need to chill sometimes as well. :-P
ReplyDelete