Children To Benefit From New Approach

Getting junk food out of public schools and introducing a provincewide breakfast program for the early years will be two of Premier John Hamm's priorities for the year ahead.

In his sixth annual State of the Province Address, the premier said today, Nov. 30, that more resources need to be dedicated to improving the physical health and academic performance of students.

"The state of our province is this: we've made good progress in many critical areas but we need to do more to build on that progress," the premier told the Halifax Chamber of Commerce. "We need to do more to help our children become healthy, well- adjusted, productive adults who make good choices for themselves, for their children, for all of us in our old age, and for our province."

Work is underway by the Department of Education and Office of Health Promotion to develop a comprehensive school-based plan to remove unhealthy foods from public schools. The Department of Education will also be consulting with school boards on putting a provincewide school breakfast program in place for early grades, building on the success of many volunteer programs.

"Getting rid of the junk food and introducing a provincewide breakfast program are part of the answer, but not the full answer to improving academic performance," said the premier. "If we are going to help our kids do better in school, we all need to pull up our socks, roll up our sleeves, honestly look at what's wrong, and work on fixing it together -- as parents, teachers, school board members, as government and, yes, as members of the business community."

Early next year, Premier Hamm and Education Minister Jamie Muir will sit down with parents, teachers and students at a major conference on education to discuss the next steps for public education. Efforts will build on Learning for Life, Nova Scotia's plan for student success.

Since 1999, funding for public education has increased by $1,400 per student, more than a million new books have been put in the province's classrooms, class sizes in the early grades have become smaller and more resources have been devoted to reading, writing and math.

"In short, we have laid the groundwork for healthier kids, for students to achieve better outcomes, and for young Nova Scotians to secure an education that will lead to a good job here at home. It's now time to till the soil," said the premier.

"As a government, we are going to apply the same kind of discipline and determination to improving the health and academic success of young Nova Scotians as we did to improving the fiscal and economic health of our province."

The premier also announced that a tentative agreement has been struck with the province's universities to ensure stable, multi- year funding in exchange for a cap on annual tuition increases for undergraduates. Details will be announced once they have been finalized by the Council of Nova Scotia University Presidents and the Department of Education.

A copy of the premier's remarks is available on the website at www.gov.ns.ca/prem/ .