ROBLIN, Man. — Representing a region’s interest and giving voice to its concerns are behind Floyd Martens’ longtime service on school boards in Manitoba and now nationally.
“When decisions are made from somewhere else by people who don’t understand the local community, it may or may not be in the best interest of the community,” said the recently elected chair of the Canadian School Boards Association.
He was first elected a school trustee in 1992 in the Roblin area and has been re-elected ever since. He served as board chair or vice-chair for that board for many years and is currently the past-president of the Manitoba School Boards Association, where he represented the Mountain View School Division.
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“The key is you need to listen lots. There is a variety of opinions on every issue,” he said.
“You’re not always going to be popular. With any decision made, someone will be unhappy.”
He noted how local school boards and their provincial association differ in scope. The latter deals more directly with the provincial government and has an advocacy role, with the changes it makes often less obvious than those made at the local level.
Voter turnout can be low for local school board elections but improves when they are combined with municipal elections and when there are issues in a community, said Martens.
He said his goal is to increase public understanding about the important role school boards play.
“Government taking over many school divisions and their decision-making processes are eroding some of the community voice,” he said of the Manitoba government’s decision in 2002 to reduce the number of school divisions in the province by one-third.
For the trustees, it meant overseeing larger divisions with more schools, diminished responsibilities, including less direct involvement in hiring principals, and a greater focus on policy directions and operations.
Martens said larger divisions also mean a larger time commitment for trustees. For him, it means travel to Dauphin for board meetings.
His division of Mountain View chose to amalgamate with neigh-bouring divisions voluntarily rather than have it imposed on it.
“This way, we could come in on the ground floor,” said Martens.
He is mainly positive about amalgamation, feeling they have not lost as much as first feared. The region held onto its six high schools, he added.
Wayne Steen, a school trustee with the Saskatchewan Rivers School Division, said similar amalgamations in Saskatchewan have been positive for students in smaller divisions who now have access to specialized services such as speech pathologists and occupational therapists and for staff members who have access to better in-service opportunities.
In Saskatchewan, the number of school divisions was consolidated into 22 from 82.
Steen felt the rural voice is still strongly heard, noting the current chair of his provincial association is from a rural region.
“Do we get the answer we want all the time? No, that’s not changed,” said Steen.
He said his urban-rural division’s biggest challenges are declining enrolments and transportation.
“It’s pretty bad when you go to school for five hours and you spend three hours to get there and back home,” he said.
Enrolment declines due to job losses and increased farm sizes locally are ongoing concerns in rural Manitoba.
Martens said his division’s international student program has injected money into the local economy through home stays and tuitions and provided revenue for the school division.
“It’s been very positive, exposing students to different cultures, and it keeps enrolments at a better place,” he said.
Martens, the father of three adult daughters and the son of a school teacher, felt he had something to contribute when first asked to run for office.
“I saw it as an opportunity to serve,” he said.
The former pastor lives in Roblin, Man., where his wife, Angela, and daughter, Melissa, run a gift and home decor shop. He stepped back from full-time ministry when the family opened that business six years ago.
He said juggling so many responsibilities meant having to rent an apartment in Dauphin and living out of a suitcase.
Martens said education has changed significantly from its beginnings in teaching children how to read and write.
“Now there’s so much information, but discerning what’s valuable and where to find it are important,” he said.
Martens was pleased to help add child psychology courses at the local high school, something he called an important life skill for future parents.
He called his decades-long involvement on school boards educational.
“It’s never been boring. When it comes to that point, I’m done,” said Martens.
