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Central Okanagan Public Schools has absorbed a $2.8 million budget shortfall for the 2025-26 school year. The budget deficit resulted from a lower than projected student enrolment for September, which impacted the per student operating fund ratio from the Ministry of Education and Childcare. For the first time in a decade, the school district experienced a decline in enrolment, with a net decrease of 147 full-time students, while the anticipated enrolment increase of 150 did not materialize. On the positive side, other student enrolment FTE (Full-time Equivalent) changes generated a net increase in operating funding of $701,000, according to a report to the Central Okanagan Board of Education by secretary-treasurer/CFO Delta Carmichael. Because of that revenue increase, the budget deficit was whittled down to $1.9 million. To compensate for the shortfall, Carmichael cited various measures taken to balance the 2025-26 budget: a reduction in teaching staff which meant four positions lost at the elementary school level; unfilled positions were left vacant; secondary schools identified efficiencies in student timetables; use of the Classroom Enhancement Fund to address classroom composition and allocation of a portion of the 2024-25 budget surplus, $400,000, to off-set this year’s budget shortfall. Trustee Amy Geistlinger questioned school district staff about the enrolment decline, saying that, anecdotally, from parents she has spoken to, the politicization of the school system is part of the reason. Board of Education chair Julia Fraser noted that in her 15 years as a trustee, she has noticed a pattern of parents enroling their kids in alternative school options at the elementary school level before they switch over to public middle and secondary schools to take advantage of a wider variety of academic and extra-curricular activity options that larger enrolment schools can offer. She also cited the impact of families leaving B.C. to pursue other employment opportunities. Fraser pointed at Okanagan College, where international student enrolment cutbacks have resulted in the loss of 16 professors due to a budget shortfall. “More often than not, those professors have families, and the lack of finding the same work elsewhere here means they and their families are moving away,” Fraser noted. In his initial budget shortfall review comments last month, Central Okanagan Public Schools superintendent Jon Rever told trustees that staff will do a “deeper dive” in the months ahead to better understand the movement of students out of the public school system, where they are going and why.
