Contact the Board

As elected officials, Trustees value public feedback and aim to be responsive to their constituents. There are many ways you can share your thoughts with the Board, including:

• writing, emailing, calling or arranging a time to speak with your Trustee
• attending school council meetings, speaking with staff at your child’s school, completing Division surveys and participating in public engagement sessions
• attending a Trustee-hosted ward event
• registering to speak at a Board meeting

Contact information for each Trustee is available on their profile page. 

Speaking at a Board meeting

Speaking at a Board meeting is just one way of communicating with the Board. Individuals registered to speak at a Board meeting have three minutes to speak and must limit their comments to an item on the meeting agenda. When registering, speakers will be asked to provide the agenda item and report title they wish to speak about. If the report is a recommendation report, the speaker will also be asked to state if they will speak in favour or against the recommendation.

Note that speaking at a Board meeting is not a two-way conversation and Trustees will not respond to questions at the meeting. If you would prefer a dialogue, please contact your Trustee or email the Board directly. 

To speak at a Board meeting, you must call the Board office by noon the business day before the meeting to register. This typically means the Monday before a Tuesday meeting; if the Monday before the meeting is a holiday, you will need to register by the previous Friday. You may not register by email.

Registration opens once the meeting agenda is posted to the Division’s website (typically by end of day Thursday before the Board meeting).

Call 780-429-8443 to register.

Guidelines for speakers

• speakers must limit comments to an item on the meeting agenda
  • individuals who wish to provide comments to the Board on a topic not on the agenda item will not be registered to speak and are encouraged to contact their Trustee via phone or email.
• comments must be kept to a maximum of three minutes and be addressed to the Board Chair
• speakers must limit their comments to their own knowledge, opinions and experiences; they may not speak on behalf of anyone else
• a maximum of five speakers may register per agenda item, and speakers will be registered in the order requests are received
• individuals or groups may speak at a Board meeting a maximum of four times per year.
• comments from the public and staff group representatives will not be audio or video recorded
• speakers must attend the Board meeting in person
  • if the meeting is held online, speakers must declare when registering that they are at least one of the following
    • a resident of Edmonton
    • a parent of a Division student
    • a Division staff member
• attendees are not permitted to bring props or signs to a Board meeting
• the Board Chair has full authority to maintain decorum and order of the meeting, including interrupting any speaker who makes critical statements about particular individuals or groups of people, whether named or identifiable by the context, ruling the speaker out of order and terminating the speaker's privilege to address the Board of Trustees

Privacy

Public comments to the Board are not livestreamed or recorded, but media may attend these meetings and you may appear in media coverage.