Trustees say B.C. schools are on the front lines of climate change, directly affected by rising temperatures and extreme weather
B.C.’s school trustees are calling on all school districts to have climate change plans and for the province to provide the resources needed to teach sustainability.
The B.C. School Trustees Association also wants money from the B.C. government for such things as retrofitting schools with air conditioning to deal with heat waves, better filters to handle wildfire smoke, and switching to electric vehicles to reduce emissions.
The number of districts with climate plans has increased to 23 from two just three years ago, according to a sustainability report released this week by the association.
That still means more than half of B.C.’s 60 school districts still don’t have plans to cope with an increase in climate-related disasters such as floods, wildfires and water shortages.
The report comes as Environment and Climate Change Canada warns global temperatures this year will likely rival 2024’s record heat.
The trustees group urges school districts across the province to include climate action as a core part of their operation, in alignment with the provincial goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent by 2030.
“We’re encouraging boards to have climate policy in place, so that they’re making climate mitigation strategies and including future climate challenges,” said Carolyn Broady, president of the B.C. School Trustees Association.
But that is going to require additional funding and support from government and not just from the Education Ministry, says Broady.
“We need to set the dollars aside somewhere, and it can’t come out of our operational funds,” she said.
“We’re very aware that some of what we put in this report is aspirational, that it’s not all going to happen overnight, but this is to start the conversation with our trustees, our boards of education, with our educational leaders, to try and start to make changes and try to share those best practices.”
Broady added there’s much work that still needs to be done to figure out the costs, especially since school districts vary in their needs. For example, coastal school districts need to consider sea level rise, while Interior school districts may be more focused on wildfires and floods.
School districts all over B.C. need to have heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems in place to handle wildfire smoke and extreme weather, said Broady, which is expensive. According to the Ministry of Infrastructure, it has already spent $300 million on HVAC upgrades in schools.
Some districts that already have climate plans include Richmond, Vancouver, Victoria, and the Fraser Valley. None of the school districts in B.C.’s Northern Interior have climate plans, according to the report.
Broady said all school districts have emergency plans but they don’t all include climate problems, and that needs to change as more climate-related emergencies happen.
Some of the other climate change issues that schools face, highlighted in the report, are food security, erosion, rising sea levels, supply-chain disruptions, rising fuel and energy costs, and aging infrastructure that becomes too costly to heat and cool.
On top of that there are concerns for the health of students, including physical stressors such as wildfire smoke and mental-health problems related to climate change anxiety.
Broady said education on positive climate actions can help, such as teaching students how to garden, plant trees, and understand Indigenous land practices.
As the planet faces mounting climate challenges, Broady said, school districts are on the front lines, directly affected by rising temperatures and the growing need for sustainable practices in education.
The report highlights the need to advocate sustainable funding, promote leadership and collaboration with provincial ministries, and make climate action a priority.
The report also calls on the trustees group to help create appropriate climate policies and strategies for school boards.
According to the Education Ministry, $300 million is earmarked for school repair and maintenance projects in the 2024-25 fiscal year, including $26.8 million in its carbon neutral program for energy and electrical upgrades to reduce greenhouse gases emissions and support climate resiliency.
For new school buildings, there is additional funding to build in climate mitigation and resiliency, such as cooling systems and flood plain adaptation measures.
The ministry said the government is making sure new school buildings align with its climate targets by installing electric heat pumps in the majority of new schools, using non-combustible construction materials to better protect schools from wildfires and requiring high standards for sustainable and energy-efficient designs.