Over the past five years, Calgary Islamic schools (“CIS”) have been under the public education system by the Palliser School Division (“Palliser”). Hopes and expectations were that this move would take the schools to the next level in all aspects; more resources, excellent building conditions, and less financial burdens on parents. Unfortunately, nothing of this happened. 

Our kids have been suffering from the freezing cold classrooms and the lack of proper air ventilation as the HVAC system has been failing for years. Classroom temperature is unbearable during winter or summer. Plumbing system is another failure that causes the washrooms to be hardly usable. Kids find it hard to handle the awful smell that spreads all day sometimes.

On the other hand, Palliser have been authorizing and forcing an illegal fees collections process since 2015 under the name of “Society Fees” and threatening parents with deregistering their kids from the school for not paying those fees. The money collected through this process have not been tracked or even justified or used for the purpose that was allegedly collected for. This year, Palliser admitted their illegal actions. In order to correct their mistakes, in their view, they imposed the same amount of money but under a different term, which is “Alternative Program Fees”. 

For the alternative program fees to be collected and paid by parents, there are four conditions that must be applied and met, as per Alberta Education Bylaws, which were completely violated by Palliser as detailed below: 

Timing
Any school fees must be decided on and communicated to parents before the school year starts. Palliser failed to meet this condition as they started communicating the alternative Program fee two months after school started already. 

Consultation
Parents must be consulted and agree on the proposed fees before making it official. Palliser never consulted school parents before posting the fees. Palliser Board of Trustees approved and imposed the fees prior to parents’ consultation. 

Justification 
As per the Alternative Program Handbook, there must be a financial shortage in the program budget to be eligible to collect fees from parents. This must be officially proven and discussed with parents as well, which have never happened. Moreover, Palliser refused on multiple occasions to demonstrate their budget of the Islamic School to show where the deficit is coming from.

Accountability 
As per the school Fees regulation, any amount of money collected from parents must be spent and dedicated for the same purpose it was collected for. Palliser failed to explain to parents where the money went since 2015. Palliser failed and refused to provide any financial documentation such as school budget and financial statements since 2015.

Therefore, we are seeking the ministry's support to conduct a full review on Palliser School Division budget related to Calgary Islamic School. We are requesting the officials to examine the buildings of the school to ensure providing a healthy learning environment to our kids. We are seeking the support of the Ministry of the Education to expose the avenues that our money monies have been collected for since 2015.