Auditor General's Opening Statement

Education in the Northwest Territories—Department of Education, Culture and Employment—May 2010 Report—9 June 2010

I am pleased to be in Yellowknife today to discuss our May 2010 Report, “Education in the Northwest Territories—Department of Education, Culture and Employment.”

Education is vital to the progress of both individuals and the Northwest Territories as a whole. It lays the foundation for success at work and throughout life and benefits the economy, society, and individual quality of life.

In 2009–10, the Department of Education, Culture and Employment allocated almost $149 million to elementary and secondary education, over $32 million to adult training and post-secondary education, and just over $5 million to early childhood programming.

Our objective in conducting this audit was to determine whether the Department had adequately planned, monitored, and reported on education and training programs designed to increase opportunities for residents to participate fully in society. We audited the Department, not the education councils or Aurora College.

Overall we found that while the Department adequately plans, monitors, and reports on some aspects of its education programs, there are areas that need attention.

I would like to focus on two areas where the Department can improve—first, by playing a leadership role in promoting programs and initiatives that meet the needs of residents, and second, by better assessing whether its programs are achieving their intended results.

While responsibility for education is shared among the Department, the education councils, and Aurora College, the Department has territory-wide responsibility for developing program standards, measuring student progress, and monitoring compliance with legislation and its standards and directives.

The Department has demonstrated leadership in some areas, but must do so to a greater extent in other areas in order to facilitate improvements to the education system.

For example, the Department has demonstrated leadership by introducing the Aboriginal Student Achievement Initiative. This initiative is aimed at improving the performance of Aboriginal students and closing the persistent gap between the graduation rates of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students. Results of pilot projects under this Initiative are to be assessed this year.

In the area of adult training, the Department has used partnerships to identify regional and community labour market needs and to help co-ordinate the delivery of training. An example is the use of a mobile trades unit, which can be transported to communities across the Northwest Territories. The unit functions as a portable classroom to deliver training to students in carpentry, plumbing, and basic construction.

However, the Department needs to play a greater leadership role in working with education councils that deliver elementary and secondary school programs across the Northwest Territories.  While high school graduation rates have increased steadily since 2005, there has been limited or no progress in other indicators of student achievement such as Alberta Achievement Test results, secondary school diploma examination results, and functional grade levels. The Department has not undertaken formal detailed analyses of the causes underlying the lack of improvement shown by these indicators and has not provided guidance to education councils to aid their development of detailed action plans for improving student performance against these same indicators. Nor has it developed a clear strategy for what it plans to do to improve student performance against the key indicators.

We found that the Department needs to better assess whether its programs are achieving the intended results. Collecting data, setting targets for performance, and then measuring and reporting the results are important to determine if programs are working as intended and to identify where improvements can be made.

For example, the Department has placed increased emphasis on educational programming in day care facilities, but it has not yet begun to collect data on this programming. Nor has it assessed whether children who attend day care facilities perform better when they enter the elementary school system than those who have not. Without this information, it is difficult for the Department to know whether early intervention is better preparing children for elementary school or what adjustments might be needed in its early childhood programs.

In addition, training programs that are established to better prepare adults for the labour market are not regularly evaluated to determine whether they should be maintained or modified, or whether new programs should be considered.

We have made a series of recommendations to the Department for improving its planning, monitoring, and reporting of education programs. We are pleased to report that the Department has agreed with all of our recommendations.

This concludes my opening remarks. I will be pleased to answer your questions now.