Kari Scheers has once again been appointed as Board Chair of the Peace Wapiti Public School Division. The 2020-2021 school year will be her second run at the head of the table, continuing her appointment from the 2019-2020 year.
Scheers says she looks forward to having another run at the position during a school year she hopes will be much closer to normal.
“It has been such a weird year with all the changes, and the government, and the pandemic that it definitely was a learning curve so I’m glad to get to try it again, go forward and maybe see how a regular school year will prevail.”
“I just hope that our parents eventually get a sense of relief and can put their kids through school knowing that everybody is safe and the kids are learning in a classroom setting face to face with a teacher by the end of the year.”
She adds some of the most significant differences for her, as well as the rest of the board during the initial onset of the novel coronavirus in Alberta, was the immediacy of the changes, as well as not being able to meet in person.
“We weren’t able to come together anymore, and plus there was a lot more emergent board meetings called to discuss all the upcoming changes the government had made, that’s a lot more different than a typical year. We usually don’t see emergent meetings being called so frequently,” she says.
For Scheers, 2020 will mark the fourth year of a four-year term on the board of trustees. She spent her first year as a trustee, her second-year as vice-chair, then moving up once again to board chair in her third year. She says the board is working to return regular schooling to as close to normalcy as quickly as possible.
“Peace Wapiti is taking every precaution necessary to keep our students and our staff as safe as we can. We will follow all of the guidelines that AHS and the government are putting out there just to maintain that sense of safety for our parents and our students and our staff.”
“I would just like to see it be continuous, back to normal, I’d like to see our schools stay safe and healthy and open.”
She adds she would like to see the progression of the board’s division plan to get schools out into rural communities and ultimately shorten bus ride times for their students.