There’s an old joke: I went to a fight – and a hockey game broke out.
Anyone who’s signed their kids up for hockey has heard it. What matters is that we trust the people setting the rules to keep the league from turning into a street brawl with skates. And if they don’t, every parent knows those people can be fired.
Public schools, though? A little murkier. They’re sprawling institutions, with administrators, policies, and jargon thick enough to choke a bureaucrat. Parents often feel powerless in the face of all that. But here’s the secret: we do control who sets the rules.
Those people are called trustees. And on October 20th, you get to choose who your local trustee is.
Here’s the crazy part: hardly anyone bothers to vote in these elections. Turnout limps along at 25% or less. Most people can’t name their trustee, let alone the candidates. It’s like complaining about the refs when you skipped the game entirely. Worse – when you skip, they get to rewrite the whole rulebook – and they might want to play a different game than you do.
Part of the confusion comes from what trustees don’t do. They don’t pick your child’s teacher. They don’t hire and fire staff. They don’t write the provincial curriculum. So, what’s left?
The answer: the rules of the game.
Superintendents are the monarchs of day- to-day operations. They decide staffing, resources, and implementation. But trustees hire or fire that Superintendent, set the budget, and decide on the division’s governing policies.
It’s all important. Monitoring budget compliance is vital. Reserve funds can be spent in questionable ways. Money meant for teachers can get spent on administrator’s pet projects instead. And a poor choice of Superintendent can make everyone’s lives miserable. But policy – that’s the rules of the game.
Want an anti-bullying policy? Trustees. A Christian program in your school? Trustees. A process for challenging library books? Trustees again. The Superintendent just carries out whatever framework trustees put in place.
Take the Alberta government’s recent order on school libraries: explicit sexual images are out, catalogues must be public, and parents must have a process to challenge books. But the government didn’t say what that process looks like. That’s up to trustees. Do they only deal with images? What about text — say, Fifty Shades of Grey in a Grade 7 library? If trustees don’t set reasonable rules, families leave, and the funding leaves with them. On the other hand, nobody wants to waste teaching time in endless book battles or see classics tossed out in moral panics. The balance — respect concerns without wrecking classrooms — comes down to trustees.
This year, more than ever, the people who set those rules matter.
Some people shrug: “I don’t have kids in school.” Irrelevant. You still live with the results. When schools fail, the products of that failure show up in courtrooms and police blotters. Or worse — they decide that political assassination is a legitimate career option. That’s not exactly the civics lesson we’re aiming for.
And let’s be practical. One day, you and I will be in a nursing home. The quality of that care will depend on the education of the people running it. At that point, whether your trustee in 2025 thought parents mattered will suddenly feel very personal.
So, interview the candidates. Ask if they’ve ever hired people, managed a budget, or — heaven forbid — listened to parents. Use the book challenge as a test: do they have a plan that balances sanity with respect? And if no candidate measures up, run yourself. Nominations close on the 22nd.
One last thing: with turnout this low, your ballot in a trustee election counts for more than at almost any other level. Think of it as democracy on clearance sale – 75% off today. It’s a good deal.
So on October 20th, go vote. Don’t let the real fight break out after the school game ends.
John Hilton-O’Brien is the Executive Director of Parents for Choice in Education, www.parentchoice.ca
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