Dear petition signers, First of all, thank you for your support. I consider it a tremendous honour to have been entrusted as a representative and public voice of your concerns. As you may remember, this petition was originally started in response to those who were calling on the Alberta government to defund Meadow & Harvest Baptist Academy at the end of August 2016. In many ways this petition helped us accomplish some important victories: 1. We earned representation in the media, meaning those against school choice were unable to monopolize the public conversation. For example, see this CBC article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/province-funds-millions-to-school-board-fighting-lgbtq-guidelines-1.3743840 2. Because of this petition I had the honour and privilege of representing your concerns to MLA Leela Aheer, who was the Education Critic for the Wildrose at the time, in a meeting last January. 3. The number of signatures on this petition helped combat the false narrative that “the vast majority” of Albertans do not support school choice. In fact, while the petition to defund the independent schools received only 1,613 signatures, ours had 3,824 signatures – almost 2.5 times the number – sending a strong and verifiable signal that Albertans continue to support a diversity of education options. However, while we have celebrated these victories, the war rages on. In fact, the threats have intensified once again with the introduction of Bill 24 in the Legislature, which could pass into law as early as this week. The government is simply changing the law to suit its purposes, consolidating power in the hands of the Education Minister to ensure that compliance to government demands is enforceable by law (for more details regarding Bill 24 concerns, read this summary: http://www.parentchoice.ca/bill_24_ndp_seeks_to_control_schools_and_isolate_children ) The reality is that those against authentic educational choice will continue lobbing their attacks. That is what they do. However, their attacks are only successful when people are either: A) inattentive and completely oblivious that the attacks even happening or B) so poorly informed they are susceptible to well-funded PR campaigns peddling falsehoods (for example: private schools only exist for “elitist”, rich families; Christian schools are unsafe and school choice costs more taxpayer money than funneling all students to the public system). While petitions are useful for specific circumstances, they are primarily reactive. What we must do is shift the emphasis from merely reactive strategies to being more proactive in our protection and preservation of authentic educational choice. When I first started this petition it was the only means I had available to publicly demonstrate the numbers and strength of our voice, as well as to network people together for a common cause. Since then I have become much more involved with the organization Parents for Choice in Education, first as a volunteer and now recently hired as a part-time communications advisor and Edmonton-area spokesperson. While I still maintain my own personal blog Informed Albertans (www.informedalbertans.wordpress.com) I have chosen to also invest myself into the efforts of PCE because I believe this organization offers three critical opportunities we need to harness in order to be successful: 1. Grow Numbers – we need to have the largest number of people possible under the same umbrella, moving the same direction at the same time in order to amplify our efforts. PCE is well-established, stable and has recently upgraded to a new website and database software program with tremendous capacity for growth. 2. Be informed & inform others – PCE offers an incredible array and depth of resources on their website that can be easily accessed and shared with others. The most effective inoculation against tyranny is a well-informed and engaged citizenry. 3. Targeted communications – Sign-up with your name, email address and postal code on PCE’s homepage and you will stay informed and up-to-date on new information and ways you can take action. Your postal code allows PCE to target communications to your specific area so if there is an event happening in your area, or a certain policy or news item that is relevant to your community then we can ensure the information gets to you. Being on PCE’s email list and taking the time to read the updates will ensure we are all kept up-to-date on new challenges and action items that we can use to amplify our voice. Sign up at www.parentchoice.ca Harnessing the website and database of PCE to proactively organize and mobilize tens of thousands of people to be informed and actively engaged will help ensure that those we elect to create our laws are representing our concerns and being effectively held accountable when they don’t. The preservation and protection of authentic school choice is an ongoing effort that will require persistence for the long-term. As the saying goes, “the price of freedom is eternal vigilance”. As I close this petition, I invite you to join me by signing up to Informed Albertans (www.informedalbertans.wordpress.com ) and/or Parents for Choice in Education (www.parentchoice.ca ) so that we can continue to stay connected. Join me and thousands of others who are committed to working together to proactively organize and mobilize Albertans to be informed and actively engaged in the preservation of authentic school choice. Thank you again for your ongoing support. Most Sincerely, Theresa Ng informedalbertans@gmail.com