Prairie Land School Division Board Chair Holli Smith giving a speech following her accepting the Community Engagement Award on behalf of the Division on Sat. Nov. 14 in Edmonton. ECA Review/Submitted
The Alberta School Boards Association (ASBA) Awards Celebration was held in Edmonton on Nov. 14, 2021, with Prairie Land School Division honoured to receive the 2021 Community Engagement Award.
Division Trustee and Board Chair Holli Smith was in attendance and graciously accepted the award on behalf of the division.
This award recognizes the dedicated efforts of Prairie Land School Division for embracing community engagement as a method to inform, involve, and gain input from stakeholders on school jurisdiction plans, programs and services.
“[We are] So excited to have been even in the running for the awards but to actually win is an incredible feeling,” shared Smith in an email with the ECA Review.
“The community engagement award is one that the Prairie Land Trustees are so excited about. We truly believe that we are the voices of our communities and in order to properly represent them and advocate for the education system they want we need to engage with them.
“This started a couple of years ago when we held meetings in each of our communities to discuss a variety of issues that the board was facing and get input on what our communities wanted to see moving forward. As well it has continued with the work of our administration in gathering each of our communities input in the assurance model that Alberta Education requires divisions to develop.
Prairie Land also won the ASBA 2021 Friends of Education Award nominating Starland County.
Students have been the benefactor of many years of funding support for the schools within the borders of Starland County, as well as contributing to programs to enhance education to all students within the division.
Over the past two years, the division has been fortunate to have two new schools being built within Starland County.
In both communities, non-profit societies were formed and initiated fundraising campaigns to enhance those schools where Starland County pledged $200,000 to each of those campaigns, totalling $400,000.
Smith concluded, “Overall the Board is very proud that our provincial organization, the Alberta School Boards Association, has recognized the important work that is being done in Prairie Land when it comes to community engagement.”
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