IMPORTANT NOTICE
The Huskies Fun Club / After School Program
July 14, 2022
Dear Families,
School Council has made the difficult decision to cancel Husky Fun Club for the 2022/2023 school year. This was not a decision that the School Council took lightly and the Council has dedicated a great deal of time over the past two years to this matter. It is not the responsibility of any school or the volunteer Council to provide childcare for families unfortunately. We committed a few weeks back to notify all families to provide notice by July 18th, so they had a month to make other arrangements, but with the way things were headed we decided to notify sooner than later. Council members also rely on this service for their children and will have to make alternative arrangements now.
We have looked into getting an established program to take it on, but everyone is struggling with finding staff and are not able to commit as they have regulations that need to be adhered to under the Childcare Act.
We have done our best to communicate with families over the past two years about the struggles with finding proper staffing and even trying to call on families to help support the program with no success. We have run job postings on Yuwin and Social Media, asked the highschools for seniors,and we have increased wages to more than what I make as a nurse per hour and have not been able to attract reliable folks. We have tried to out source to already established facilities, but they are also struggling with finding staff and are not able to commit as they have regulations that need to be adhered to under the Childcare Act. We have now had to look at things from a safety issue perspective, especially in light of what occurred at the school previously. It is not safe for either staff or children to have 1-2 staff looking after 30+ kids. We are in the same position as many many businesses in Yukon right now, where we cannot find staff.
As a bit of background, this program was originally a trial project done by the Boys and Girls Club of Yukon at a few schools in 2010 and we were lucky enough to be a test site. Unfortunately BGCY was not able to secure proper funding to keep the program running, so they cancelled it at all schools. The School Council agreed to take this program (not Yukon Education/HVS) and continue to try and keep the program going since we are the only school that does not have easy access to after school care for children. No other public school in the Whitehorse catchment provides after school care as we have been approached by many other schools in the past who have wanted to trial this.
Kind regards,
Hidden Valley School Council
July 14, 2022
Dear Families,
School Council has made the difficult decision to cancel Husky Fun Club for the 2022/2023 school year. This was not a decision that the School Council took lightly and the Council has dedicated a great deal of time over the past two years to this matter. It is not the responsibility of any school or the volunteer Council to provide childcare for families unfortunately. We committed a few weeks back to notify all families to provide notice by July 18th, so they had a month to make other arrangements, but with the way things were headed we decided to notify sooner than later. Council members also rely on this service for their children and will have to make alternative arrangements now.
We have looked into getting an established program to take it on, but everyone is struggling with finding staff and are not able to commit as they have regulations that need to be adhered to under the Childcare Act.
We have done our best to communicate with families over the past two years about the struggles with finding proper staffing and even trying to call on families to help support the program with no success. We have run job postings on Yuwin and Social Media, asked the highschools for seniors,and we have increased wages to more than what I make as a nurse per hour and have not been able to attract reliable folks. We have tried to out source to already established facilities, but they are also struggling with finding staff and are not able to commit as they have regulations that need to be adhered to under the Childcare Act. We have now had to look at things from a safety issue perspective, especially in light of what occurred at the school previously. It is not safe for either staff or children to have 1-2 staff looking after 30+ kids. We are in the same position as many many businesses in Yukon right now, where we cannot find staff.
As a bit of background, this program was originally a trial project done by the Boys and Girls Club of Yukon at a few schools in 2010 and we were lucky enough to be a test site. Unfortunately BGCY was not able to secure proper funding to keep the program running, so they cancelled it at all schools. The School Council agreed to take this program (not Yukon Education/HVS) and continue to try and keep the program going since we are the only school that does not have easy access to after school care for children. No other public school in the Whitehorse catchment provides after school care as we have been approached by many other schools in the past who have wanted to trial this.
Kind regards,
Hidden Valley School Council