School review process 'had a lot of disrespect for people,' says Pat Mella

Pat Mella, one of three board members of the Public Schools Branch tasked with making decisions on closing schools in the province early last year, said she felt like government threw her and her colleagues under the bus. 

In January 2017, a report said five schools on the Island should be closed. The board eventually recommended following through on the closure of just two schools, Georgetown Elementary in Kings County and St. Jean's in Charlottetown.

The day after those recommendations were made public, Premier Wade MacLauchlan said the government would not close any schools.

In a resignation letter to the education minister shortly thereafter, Mella called the government's move "an incredible display of personal disrespect."

Now, in an interview with CBC News: Compass host Louise Martin, Mella said she didn't have a problem with the decision itself, but with the fact that it came before the public had a chance to understand their reasoning.

"The issue was that the process itself was very challenging and it had a lot of disrespect for people and actually outright abuse, so it was difficult and challenging and we thought we made really good decisions," Mella said.

"It's ironic that I kinda felt like the very things we're trying to teach students, you know against bullying, against abusive language, intolerance, these kinds of things, we try to teach students this is not appropriate behaviour and yet we had people who behaved that way and they won, so to speak."

She noted that the closure recommendations had impacts beyond the two schools themselves, in areas such as rezoning, bus routes and class sizes.

"I felt that the public didn't get a chance to actually assess our decisions, why we made them, what was going to improve in the education system in the province as a result of our decisions, not just relating to the two schools, but to everything else."

Mella said the meeting the night the board released their recommendations was very heated but she thought she could put up with it all if the public could hear their reasoning.

"But when the decision by government was made so quickly, maybe we looked like we were just a front that it really didn't matter what work we had done," Mella said.

She says she's moved on from the decision and knows the government had the final say on the recommendations.

"Some decisions are not politically popular but they're the right ones and I know that from having been in government," she said. "Not all decisions should be made because politically it's to the benefit of the people that are in office, I think in some cases you have to make decisions that are the best for the education system."

Some decisions are not politically popular but they're the right ones and I know that from having been in government.— Pat Mella

​Mella doesn't feel it was a waste of time for the work they put in because many recommendations have been implemented, but noted there are discrepancies between schools when it comes to things such as teacher workload.

"At the end of the day, we were about students and teachers and whether or not we're going to be able to maintain a great education system, which I do think we have."

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