Briefing Nova Scotia’s chief medical officer of health, Dr. Robert Strang, and Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Zach Churchill briefed reporters today (some in person, some on the phone) on the province’s plan to send students back to their classrooms on September 8. Churchill began by recapping previously announcedRead More

Being a pathological optimist, it didn’t occur to me to wonder, when Nova Scotia Education Minister Zach Churchill canceled international school trips on March 4, if there would be any disruptions to my own classroom. Nor did I think we wouldn’t be back after March Break. Or that we wouldn’tRead More

I‘ve been writing regularly about poverty, especially child poverty and especially in the CBRM, for over a year now — looking at the possibility of a guaranteed annual income (GAI), the grim local statistics and creative solutions to problems like hunger and homelessness that might work here, among other aspectsRead More

Equalize this Developments on the equalization front this week must be gratifying to the stalwart members of Nova Scotians for Equalization Fairness (NSEF), a CBRM-based advocacy group that has been meeting monthly to discuss the issue of municipal financing for 15 long years. Against the backdrop of budget discussions, whichRead More

French lessons This week, I’ve run across three Quebec news stories that are oddly relevant to events here in the CBRM. That’s not as completely random as it sounds: I keep tabs on events in Quebec by starting each day listening to the first half hour of Quebec AM, the QuebecRead More

This space had been reserved for reporting the results of an interview I did last Thursday with Nova Scotia Education Minister Zach Churchill. I thought I’d have some new insight into the government’s determination to push through the recommendations in educational consultant Avis Glaze’s administrative review of the Nova Scotia educationRead More

Cape Breton University may need a new president but does it have to be David “Entitled to my Entitlements” Ding-wall? I thought he was good for a Senate pew. Instead of president, hire Ding-wall as a fundraiser and re-open the search for a leader. In spite of his history ofRead More

Education consultant Avis Glaze is clearly a quick study: hired in October 2017, she was given until the end of December to conduct an administrative review of the Nova Scotia education system. She crammed 91 in-person meetings (with individuals or groups) into 19 business days (I’m assuming she didn’t workRead More