Our news
News about public education in British Columbia
-
Please lead with love: activism and disability funding changes
My children are autistic and ADHD, and for years I have watched the system grind them into shapes it found more convenient — watched accommodation requests disappear into bureaucratic silence,…
-
On scarcity, constrained choices, and the lie of complicity
I have been watching the fallout from British Columbia’s new disability funding model unfold across social media for almost a week, and on Family Day, I am sitting down to…
-
Gatekeeping the disability supplement
BC’s redesigned Children and Youth with Support Needs system, announced February 10, 2026, introduces a fundamental architectural flaw that will defund thousands of families currently receiving autism support: mandatory Disability Tax…
-
The relationship between interest holder recommendations and government decisions
The redesigned Children and Youth with Support Needs system announced on February 10, 2026, introduces two new direct-funding streams—BC Children and Youth Disability Benefit and BC Children and Youth Disability Supplement—plus an…
-
Ollie and the architecture of the “moderate” child
In the government’s explanatory materials, there is a child named Ollie. Ollie has autism. He is highly verbal. He does not have an intellectual disability. He struggles significantly in social…
-
What happens when a system can see the money but not the child
Robin is fourteen years old. He is officially enrolled at a Vancouver high school. The district receives Category G autism designation funding for him. The province is paying for his…
-
Changes to disability funding
Note: this is a rapidly evolving story. The ministry promises to provide more details as soon as possible. So please keep checking ministry sources for the latest. While this site…
-
Does BC know how much they’re spending to make our lives miserable?
A guide to following the money from classroom crisis to courtroom settlement. When a student gets hurt at school, when a family files a human rights complaint about exclusion, or…
-
Scarcity in public education is economically irrational and faster escalation is the only logical action
BC school districts operate under a funding model that often treats disability accommodations as optional costs instead of legal requirements. Disabled children’s access to education is framed as a budget…
-
Funding inclusion: how the Ministry forces BC school districts to butcher budgets
BC school boards create a zero sum game, drawing inclusion funding from operating costs, pitting parents against each other to fight for funds.
-
BC school districts spend millions fighting families instead of educating children
When parents hire lawyers to enforce their children’s right to education, people say they’re “taking money from the classroom.” But when districts spend millions on legal fees fighting those same…
-
We don’t want to be doing this
I hear it constantly from other parents: “I don’t know how you do it—I could never fight the school like that.” Sometimes it comes wrapped in admiration, sometimes in uncomfortable recognition that…
-
BC schools are designed to fail disabled kids—and make you blame them for it
The playground closes. Your kid loses recess. The field trip gets cancelled. And the school says it’s because one child’s behaviour made it “unsafe for everyone.” Sound familiar? Here’s what…
-
BC teacher negotiations: what parents need to know
Negotiations between BC’s 52,000 public school teachers and the provincial government reached an impasse in mid-January 2026, stalling over classroom conditions, workload pressures, and the resources required to meet student…
-
Why are disabled children still being excluded from BC public schools?
The BC NDP inherited a crisis and chose to manage its appearance rather than confront its scale For eight years, the BC NDP has governed this province promising investments in…
-
FAQ on school exclusion economics
Why are disabled children still being excluded from BC public schools after 8 years of NDP government? The BC NDP inherited a profoundly broken system from 16 years of BC…
-
Reframing the crisis: a summary of Parker’s critique of neoliberalism in education
In her 2022 article for Critical Education, Parker examines the deep entanglement between neoliberal economic ideology and the governance of public education in Canada. She argues that this ideological framework, which…
-
BC schools: the highway to prison and suicide
This is not a pipeline. It is a conveyor belt greased with neglect. Children are vanishing from classrooms and showing up in courtrooms because of what they learned at school.…
-
Why the benefits of split-grade classrooms collapse under austerity
Differentiated instruction, student-centred pacing, and inclusive classroom strategies are frequently celebrated as hallmarks of modern pedagogy. In their 2022 article for Academic Matters, UBC faculty Siobhán McPhee and Michael Jerowsky describe…
-
When budget decisions shape classroom design, pedagogy becomes a casualty
While proponents of blended classrooms may cite research suggesting positive academic or social outcomes, we must ask—positive for whom, and at what cost? The data may reflect aggregate gains, but…
-
Public school districts often claim they are woefully underfunded while simultaneously sitting on enormous real estate portfolios.
For example, the Vancouver School Board (VSB) owns 223 properties assessed at over $9.5 billion, including not only school buildings but also apartments, a shopping mall, daycare sites, and more reddit.com. Yet the…
-
Reversing the decline of inclusion in BC’s schools
In earlier years, BC school districts made earnest efforts to improve accessibility and inclusion for students with disabilities. However, as funding pressures mounted, many districts began viewing supports and accommodations…
-
Scope of budget cuts USA vs BC
There are many ways to dismantle public education. Some leaders do it slowly, through attrition and austerity, with spreadsheets that flatten need into numbers. Others do it suddenly, with executive…
-
From Trump’s education cuts to BC’s funding shifts: a comparative analysis
When a government says it wants to make education more efficient, it rarely means more just. The language of improvement—streamlining, restoring greatness, rebalancing budgets—is often the first sign that something…
-
Debility is the design: How engineered scarcity punishes complex children in BC schools
In British Columbia, families are told that public education is inclusive, progressive, and governed by principles of equity. But for thousands of disabled children, school is a place of attrition—where…
-
What does school funding have to do with collective punishment? Everything.
The phrase collective punishment might conjure images of authoritarian regimes or military retaliation—of innocent people punished for the actions of others, held accountable as a group rather than as individuals with rights,…
-
On gaslighting and grief in BC schools
There’s a particular kind of heartbreak that comes not just from watching your child suffer, but from realising that the people responsible for that suffering will never acknowledge it—will never…
-
When diagnosis comes too late: autistic girls and BC education outcomes
A new longitudinal study out of British Columbia reveals something many families already know: autistic girls are being overlooked—and the consequences show up all the way through school. Using over…
-
Pennies on the dollar: The real cost of refusing clean air in BC classrooms
Every day parents and students navigate a school environment where polluted air—thick with exhaust, particulates and industrial odours—inflicts physical harm; this post argues that the refusal to install basic filtration…
-
From power to partnership: changing how we talk to families
In the Canary Collective’s recent post, the author calls on teachers to recognise the power inherent in their role and to transform their relationships with families—especially those of disabled students—into…
