Province increasing education funding by $204 million

The number of overall students in BC increased to over 667,000 this year, the highest number since 2004.

This includes a net increase of around 10,400 students who moved to BC from outside of the province. In addition, the province says there was a net increase of nearly 1,000 students moving from independent to public education this year.

Because of the increase in enrolment, the province is adding an extra $204 million in operating and special grants being to support public school districts. The province says this is on top of $6.3 billion from preliminary estimates in March.

The increase includes:

• an additional $69.6 million for students with special needs, an 11.1% increase
• an additional $7.5 million targeted for Indigenous education, an 8.2% increase
• an additional $3.7 million for English and French Language Learning, a 3.6% increase.

The province also says they are investing over $21.5 billion over three years to deliver K-12 education, a $3.4 billion increase from five years ago,

Rural schools have been allocated $331.8 million dollars, an increase of $9.7 million from a last year, and $59.6 million from 2016-2017.

The province is also allocating $98.1 million to Indigenous education, and increase of $28.8 million from five years ago.

Students with special needs are being supported with $696.6 million in supplemental funding, an increase of $231.9 million from five-years ago.