Kudos to the North Vancouver School District for taking its first baby steps into the, um — 20th century — with its decision to allow video recording of school board meetings.
Granted, it took a fair bit of navel-gazing for trustees to come around to what is seemingly obvious — that allowing a public window on their decisions is a good idea.
In the age of Periscope and Snapchat, it’s somewhat surprising that a 1980s technology has inspired such rumination.
But the supportive comments from trustees this week were a significant distance from the knee-jerk reaction that prevailed at the board table when a parent first propped up his iPad and pushed Record six months ago.
We’d still argue the policy doesn’t go far enough.
Perhaps trustees have trouble distinguishing between protecting students within school activity and what adults discuss in open government forums. But fundamentally they are discussing the people’s business in their meetings. There’s no reason why anyone who attends shouldn’t be part of the public record — whether they wish to be or not.
A video is a potentially powerful record. It not only allows us to hear what was said, but also the tone of the voice used. It shows who was silent, who got red in the face, who was texting their way through a presentation.
Parents are those with the biggest stake in what happens at school board. For practical reasons, they’re also the least likely to turn up to meetings.
The new policy goes the first step to providing a small window on decisions that impact their kids’ lives.
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