Streamlining
What is Streamlining?
Streamlining is the Ministry of Education’s commitment to reducing its administrative burden (reporting requirements and information requests) on school districts.
Schools and school districts have told us that they are overburdened with paperwork. The Ministry has responded by:
- Taking an inventory of the information it requires the field to provide
- Simplifying, reducing or eliminating the reporting requirements where possible.
Why is Streamlining Important?
The Ministry of Education allocates over $5 billion annually to fund schools in the 60 public school districts and approximately 350 independent school authorities. To maintain accountability in the education system, the Ministry requires information (ranging from financial reports to student demographics) from school districts and authorities that receive funding. These reports require a lot of staff time and effort.
By simplifying, reducing or eliminating requirements, streamlining allows school district staff to use their time more effectively. Less time and money spent on administrative functions means that more resources can go to students in the classroom.
Guiding Principles
The Ministry of Education has adopted the following principles to guide the collection of data and reports from school districts – information collected by the Ministry should:
- support student achievement
- be necessary for accountability (all data collected from the school system are used)
- align across the ministry
- be customized according to district needs/status
- relate to new or changed information
- align with district timelines and processes
- leverage technology and shared systems
If you have questions regarding streamlining or are a school district that requires access to the ministry SharePoint site, please contact EDUC.Streamlining@gov.bc.ca.
