Board of Trustees of Rocky View Schools (RVS) approved minimal increases to school fees for the 2025-26 school year.
The decision was made after a brief discussion during the April 17 board meeting, despite increases in the costs of materials, travel, equipment and other items required in many optional courses, programs, field trips and other activities.
Fees for Programs of Choice, such as Building Futures and the Mechanics Training Centre, remain unchanged, ensuring students continue to have access to these diverse and enriching opportunities.
It is important to note that 80 per cent of current school fees across the division have been maintained as is. As for the 20 per cent with increases, less than half increased to the maximum $10 or five per cent.
"Costs are what costs are, and fees may need to fluctuate to cover those," RVS Superintendent, Greg Luterbach, said.
Trustees did underline that a school division could not afford to waive the fees. It has been attempted previously to see what it would cost; however, it could not be sustained for more than a year.
It is essential to note that this amount is the maximum a school or a teacher could charge. If the revenue is in excess of $25 or more per student for a particular course or item, parents are issued a refund
"I think it's quite exciting that the schools fell mostly within the range and so that job for everybody is getting a little bit easier," Ward 5 Trustee and Vice Chair, Judi Hunter said.
Even though Ward 1 Trustee Shali Bazuik was in favour of the motion, she still found it frustrating that parents have to pay for fees at all. Instead she favoured the idea of students having the ability to take the courses that they desire to take without having to worry about the cost.
Families with low or modest incomes who qualify for the federal Goods and Services Tax (GST) credit can apply to have optional course fees waived.
"Although I can appreciate that there is a mechanism for those who can't afford to pay, we'll never know the number of kids and families who don't bother taking the program or the class because they can't afford this," Bazuik expressed.
Some of those families may not qualify to have the fees waived either, she added; highlighting the point that many of these optional courses are really not optional as students might require them to graduate.
Additionally, RVS staff shared, 117 fees have been eliminated as they were no longer required. However, 106 new optional courses and extracurricular activity fees were added.
The reason being, in some cases there have been changes in grade configurations. Suddenly, now schools that had fees for Grade 9 and high schools, they may not need that in Airdrie. Though now middle schools are multi schools need that Grade 9 fee to be on their fee schedule.
The approved schedule of school fees will be posted to the RVS website and school websites by the end of June.
