Province increases school funding

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This article was published 11/02/2025 (296 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba government announced Monday an increase in school operating funding that will see the Brandon School Division receive a four per cent rise in provincial operating support, when combined with school nutrition funding.

At the same time, the province admitted that the long-anticipated overhaul of the way schools are funded is still a work in progress, and that school divisions retain the power to set a local levy on property taxes as a means to increase operating funds.

The total 3.4 per cent overall increase in provincial spending on education, for the school year that starts in September, matches the rate increase that took effect last fall.

Last year, the Brandon School Division received an 8.5 per cent funding increase for the 2024-25 school year — 10 per cent if the nutrition funding was included — for a total of $6.8 million.

This year, the 4.0 per cent funding rise for the BSD represents approximately $3.7 million in new provincial spending for a total provincial operating allocation of $77.9 million for the 2025-26 school year.

Brandon will also see a 0.5 per cent funding increase with federal nutrition funding, which is not accounted for in the provincial figure.

When reached by the Sun, Brandon School Division board of trustees chair Linda Ross said the board had yet to receive detailed information on the province’s latest funding announcement.

“We might not even get those today,” Ross said Monday. “It might be a day or two before we get those. Until we see the details, we won’t know what that means for the division.”

Ross said that while the division is aware of an overall 4.0 per cent increase in provincial funding compared to last year, it remains unclear how much of the $77.9-million total will be allocated specifically for nutrition programs.

The Sun requested the allocation breakdown for the Brandon School Division and other divisions in western Manitoba Monday afternoon, but the did not receive the information by the evening deadline. Ross said she contacted secretary-treasurer Dennis Labossiere and Supt. Matthew Gustafson after reviewing the funding announcement, in order to clarify the specifics. But she was informed that the details were not yet available.

“They do this every year,” Ross said. “They put out this media release, and then nobody can comment on it because we don’t know what it means for us,” she said.

The province also announced a $6.8-million boost to its $30-million school nutrition program.

“We’ve introduced some incremental changes this year,” said Tracy Schmidt, the province’s minister for education and early childhood learning, during a Monday morning press conference.

The NDP government is also tweaking its funding formula to help schools that face declining enrolment. Funding will now be based on the highest enrolment over a three-year period instead of the latest year. There is also a minimum one per cent increase for school divisions this year.

Divisions that have growing student populations, smaller tax bases or challenges specific to being a rural or remote school, including lengthy school bus rides, will receive higher funding increases.

The province also announced plans to build a new kindergarten-to-Grade 8 school in the Transcona area of Winnipeg. The building is to include 74 child-care spaces.

The Sun reported last year that several schools in Brandon and across the province faced hundreds of millions of dollars in urgent infrastructure needs to ensure student and staff safety. In Brandon, those included funds needed for heating systems, facility repairs and other building upgrades.

When speaking with the Sun, Schmidt said that capital investment announcements will be made closer to her government’s upcoming spring budget. She also noted that new school construction announcements will also be forthcoming.

“We are well aware of the need in Brandon for both those renovation projects … and also new school projects that are on the wish list,” Schmidt said. “We made our first announcement today about a new school in the Transcona area of Winnipeg, and I really look forward to be able to share future new schools with you as we move towards our spring budget.”

Manitoba’s school funding system has faced criticism because it relies partly on property taxes, which can make it harder for schools in poorer areas to raise funds.

The former Progressive Conservative government had promised to phase out education tax on property, although it did not spell out what would replace it.

Schmidt said the overhaul is ongoing and the government has revived an advisory group on the issue.

“We can all agree that the school funding formula needs some work — that the way that it exists today, without necessary adjustments, perpetuates somewhat we might call inequities,” Schmidt said.

“I would describe the changes that we made in this particular year to be incremental, but we’ll be building on those changes as we go forward.”

The minister also offered advice to school division boards that would be considering increasing local taxes.

“Manitobans, now more than ever, are looking for affordability, so we would strongly encourage and are happy to work with school divisions across the province to ensure that they’re finding the right balance in meeting the needs of their division and their students,” Schmidt said. “But also recognizing that need for affordability in their communities.”

The Opposition Progressive Conservatives accused the government of dragging its feet.

“Those who were hopeful for a revamped, more equitable education funding model for the province of Manitoba did not receive that today,” said Tory education critic Grant Jackson. “They’ve been in government for a year and six months now. They could have undertaken that work to develop a new funding model and they haven’t done it.”

The previous PC government had also attempted to find a new funding model for public education in Manitoba, an effort that Jackson admitted had failed to accomplish while in power.

“It’s certainly something that the previous government never did get rolled out,” Jackson said. “And you know, it is a challenging proposition, funding education properly in this province. I would say that our Conservative caucus continues to believe that we can’t do it on the property education tax model.”

Also Monday, the province announced it is expanding its community schools program to include five additional sites, for a total of 53. Each recipient receives a grant amounting to roughly $80,000.

In a press release issued Monday afternoon, the Manitoba School Boards Association said it welcomes the additional funds this year.

“This is a good start,” said association president Sandy Nemeth. “School boards are playing catchup from successive years of inadequate funding that transcends several governments.”

» mgoerzen@brandonsun.com, with files from Abiola Odutola, The Canadian Press and Winnipeg Free Press