Attention all permanent teachers of the LBPSB. The application deadline for the Riva and Thomas O. Hecht Scholarship Program is February 15, 2012.
The three-week program takes place under the direction of the expert faculty of the Yad Vashem Seminars for Educators from Abroad, International School for Holocaust Studies. The goal of the program at Yad Vashem is to provide professional development activities to teachers of all faiths and ethnicities from all parts of the world, for teaching about the Holocaust and anti-Semitism in the classrooms. To learn more, following the links below.
The Lester B. Pearson School Board is an equal opportunity employer and values diversity in its workforce, encouraging all qualified applicants to apply. We are committed to developing inclusive, barrier-free selection processes and work environments.
Congratulations to St Paul Elementary School
Students and staff at St. Paul Elementary are celebrating the recent announcement that their school placed first in the nation-wide Majesta Trees of Knowledge contest. The school has been awarded with a $20,000, custom-design outdoor classroom from Majesta.
St. Paul Elementary was the only school in Quebec to be chosen as one of 10 finalists from across Canada. Each participating school submitted a design of what their outdoor classroom would look like. St. Paul Elementary’s classroom will feature a movable chalkboard, stump seating, bird houses, games logs, reading circles and much more. Building of the classroom will start in April or May, which will allow the students and staff to begin enjoying the classroom before the end of the school year.
Popular vote decided the winner of the contest and St. Paul Elementary received 59,727 votes. “I would like to thank everyone who took the time to vote for us,” said Judi Pyves, Principal of St. Paul Elementary. “The students and staff are looking forward to using the outdoor classroom. A big thank you to Majesta and to the two parents, Linda Thompson and Monica Szekely, who headed this project on behalf of the school.”
Award-winning quartet performs at Lindsay Place High School
More than 300 music students at Lindsay Place High School took part in a unique homecoming experience when they attended an exclusive concert in the school’s auditorium on October 17th. The Juno Award nominated Chet Doxas Quartet performed for students enrolled in the high school’s music program. The quartet has performed throughout the world and has been recognized with a number of prestigious awards. Three of the four members of the quartet graduated from Lindsay Place high School and started their distinguished musical careers in the school’s music program. The concert was a chance for the musicians to give back to their community and was a true homecoming event for them.
The quartet was founded by renowned jazz musician Chet Doxas. The four members have performed at many of Canada’s major music festivals, including a concert at the Montreal International Jazz Festival and at the Vancouver and Victoria International Jazz Festivals. The quartet features Academy Award and Grammy Award nominated guitarist, Ben Charest, bassist Zack Lober and drummer, Jim Doxas.
The Lindsay Place High School music program has a long and storied tradition of excellence. It was developed more than 30 years ago by George Doxas, who started the program with very few instruments but slowly built it to become an outstanding music program. The high school’s music department now offers complete orchestra and concert band programs and is the only high school in the West Island to offer students an Art Etude Music Concentration diploma.
Score with School Program
The Lester B. Pearson School Board recently took part in a joint press conference to announce its participation with the English Montreal School Board at an Ontario University Athletics (OUA) regular season game between the McGill Redmen and Royal Military College. The game will take place on Friday, December 2nd at the Verdun Auditorium where more than 3,000 students from the LBPSB and EMSB will be in attendance. The LBPSB’s Chairman, Suanne Stein Day was on hand to represent the school board during the press conference along with a number of LBPSB officials.
Martin Routhier, a former Redmen captain, is reviving the Score with School Program he introduced while serving as president of the Montreal Juniors. In the coming weeks, McGill players will visit a number of LBPSB’s schools to illustrate the importance of focusing on education and striving for a university degree.
Extract from the Chairman's report of September 26, 2011
LBPSB by the Numbers
Lately, the value of school boards has been under attack by those who make sweeping, generalized statements aimed at misleading you, our community. I’d like to pass on information that I believe truly represents the value the school board offers and how the incredibly professional, talented people in this building make a huge difference in the ability to offer quality, innovative and effective education of our students. The results, of course, cannot be denied – we have one of the highest success rates in the province and continue to improve upon it.
While these numbers represent our board in 2008-2009, the latest figures available from MELS, the numbers today would only show even higher percentages of our resources focused on the students.
Teaching Support Activities: 24.96%
(In school administration, library, computers, psychologists/speech therapist, student life, animation, health and social services, school success, teacher PD)
Furniture, building and equipment: 9.8%
Council of Commissioners: 0.21%
Administrative Activities: 5.77%
(Finance, IT, Legal & Archives, Transportation Management, Payroll Services, Union Negotiators, and senior management).
With less than 6% of our budget, the board meets all our reporting requirements to MELS (Financial, Registration, Grades, Strategic Plans, Annual Reports and Management Success Agreements),
manages our Educational Services and Student Services, coordinates transportation to 51 buildings
for about 15,000 students, manages the payroll, recruitment and human resources function for 4,500 employees, provides legal and archive services, maximizes our relationships with vendors resulting in minimum pricing for so many of the products used in our classrooms daily, coordinates quality food and nutrition services (and education!) including the delivery of hot meals to schools without cafeterias and management of a Hungry Kids program allowing us to provide meals for many students in need, and maintains our internet and computer network services 24/7. It also includes all of the photocopy machines and telephones in schools and centers, all of the software to run accounting and payroll systems in schools and centers and report cards, two architects and two engineers to oversee the 57 buildings in the school board network, two lawyers to oversee all legal issues, and three accountants to ensure proper accounting practices and tax laws are respected for a $250 million budget.
Any organization, public or private, would be hard pressed to deliver this more economically.
Well before MELS introduced legislation requiring us to reduce our expenses, LBPSB started the rationalization process. We started reducing headcounts and related expenses as our population decreased before Law 100 came into effect, and we continue to do so. We started our Energy Projects before MELS required reductions in energy costs. We did so because we take our role of managing public funds and providing the best education possible to our students very seriously. Always have.
Lester B. Pearson School Board Adopts 2011-2012 Budget
The Lester B. Pearson School Board’s (LBPSB) Council of Commissioners adopted its budget for the 2011-2012 school year at its June 27th, 2011 Council meeting.
The LBPSB budget has $217,252,302 in revenues and $219,263,913 in expenses. The Minister of Education, Leisure and Sports has frozen school board surplus’ but is permitting boards to use up to 10% of the accumulated surplus to June 30th, 2010, excluding the book value of land. With this 10%, the school board
is presenting a balanced budget.
The 2011-2012 budget was a difficult balancing act as the budget rules were delayed and included over
$100 million in cuts, province-wide, to school boards. The Lester B. Pearson School Board has been proactive during the past several years by reducing expenses and developing new revenue sources in order to deliver high quality education and service to its students. Through various initiatives, the LBPSB has been able to make up much of the funding shortfall without affecting the classroom.
The Lester B. Pearson School Board’s graduation rate is currently higher than the provincial target graduation rate and through its strategic plan it has created numerous initiatives to decrease the number of students choosing to drop out of school.
The school board has increased resources for literacy in the early grade levels while creating magnet
programs throughout every high school. The Adult and Vocational Programs continue to grow with the expansion of the Gordon Robertson Centre in 2011, the authorization to provide a vocational training
program in Plumbing at Beurling Academy and the renovation of Riverdale High School to include the new program of general building maintenance and other vocational and adult classes.
The LBPSB will be welcoming students to its newest elementary school, Birchwood Elementary School in Saint-Lazare, for the 2011-2012 school year. Birchwood will educate more than 400 students and feature a double gym and a multi-purpose room with at kitchen to be used as an agora-cafeteria.
The Lester B. Pearson School Board continues to implement new initiatives to benefit students
throughout its system including:
Continuation of an early literacy program targeting elementary schools in the Verdun and LaSalle area.
Continuation of the Kindergarten-for-four-year-olds program in five elementary schools in order to better prepare those students for the full-time educational program starting in Kindergarten.
Expansion of the work oriented training pathways program across the secondary network.
Second year of the Français Plus program in Cycle 2 of Saint Edmund Elementary School and the creation of the program in Birchwood, Terry Fox, and Maple Grove elementary schools.
The second year of increasing French language instruction at the Cycle 1 level for all secondary schools to a minimum of 50%.
Offering a Language Plus program in three elementary schools whereby students can participate in language courses in Mandarin, Spanish and Italian.
Introduction of the Matrix program at Westwood Junior High School whereby parents will purchase laptops for their Grade 7 students to be used throughout the school day.
Introduction of the Multimedia, Arts and Communication program at Macdonald High School.
Expansion of the International Studies Centre - John Killingbeck Pavilion to include more international students living at the centre and the creation of the International Language Centre -Marcus Tabachnick Pavilion for the International Pre-Kindergarten Program where three and four year olds follow an educational program which includes instruction in three languages, English, French, and one of Spanish, Greek, Italian, or Mandarin.
The LBPSB continues to be focused on student success and staff professional development, as well as continuing our safe and caring schools initiative, building and infrastructure improvements and information technology. The 2011-2012 school year will be a challenging year from a budget perspective but the school board’s efforts over the past few years to cut costs by becoming more efficient at all levels of board operations is now paying dividends for our students and staff.
To view notes from meetings of the Council of Commissioners, click on the links below.
Attention all permanent teachers of the LBPSB. The application deadline for the Riva and Thomas O. Hecht Scholarship Program is February 15, 2012.
Students and staff at St. Paul Elementary are celebrating the recent announcement that their school placed first in the nation-wide Majesta Trees of Knowledge contest. The school has been awarded with a $20,000, custom-design outdoor classroom from Majesta.
More than 300 music students at Lindsay Place High School took part in a unique homecoming experience when they attended an exclusive concert in the school’s auditorium on October 17th. The Juno Award nominated Chet Doxas Quartet performed for students enrolled in the high school’s music program. The quartet has performed throughout the world and has been recognized with a number of prestigious awards. Three of the four members of the quartet graduated from Lindsay Place high School and started their distinguished musical careers in the school’s music program. The concert was a chance for the musicians to give back to their community and was a true homecoming event for them.
The Lester B. Pearson School Board recently took part in a joint press conference to announce its participation with the English Montreal School Board at an Ontario University Athletics (OUA) regular season game between the McGill Redmen and Royal Military College. The game will take place on Friday, December 2nd at the Verdun Auditorium where more than 3,000 students from the LBPSB and EMSB will be in attendance. 
The LBPSB’s Chairman, Suanne Stein Day was on hand to represent the school board during the press conference along with a number of LBPSB officials. 
