Our Mission
The Parent Advocacy Network for Public Education is a grassroots collective of parents from across Vancouver who share a commitment to public education. Our mission is to connect parents across the district to support one another in advocacy. The network enables us to share information and experiences, and to stand together in protecting public education.
The BC public education system has seen a long history of adverse policies and chronic underfunding. Parents feel the impact of cuts to resources and programs, lack of facilities maintenance, pressure to fund everything from books to photocopy paper, and in the growing inequalities between schools. Most recently, the government is pressuring the VSB to comply with the EY report and close the equivalent of 19 schools. We invite parents from Vancouver schools to join our network to receive news on advocacy issues they can share with their PAC and/or fellow parents. For more information, please email us.
The BC public education system has seen a long history of adverse policies and chronic underfunding. Parents feel the impact of cuts to resources and programs, lack of facilities maintenance, pressure to fund everything from books to photocopy paper, and in the growing inequalities between schools. Most recently, the government is pressuring the VSB to comply with the EY report and close the equivalent of 19 schools. We invite parents from Vancouver schools to join our network to receive news on advocacy issues they can share with their PAC and/or fellow parents. For more information, please email us.
About Us
We are a grassroots group of parents representing schools across Vancouver who share a deep commitment to public education and are extremely concerned for its future. We see an urgent need for schools to connect with one another through advocacy groups to share information and support one another. In addition to our Google Group, we maintain this website and hold face-to-face monthly meetings to support individuals or groups in each school that are already engaged in advocacy and we welcome other schools to designate a representative through PAC to join us. Together we can share research and information about public education and current policies that impact Vancouver schools as well as upcoming advocacy initiatives happening in Vancouver. In this way we see ourselves as supporting and complementing existing groups such as FACE, PENS, DPAC, and BCCPAC in the work they are doing.
PAN's Steering Committee
Amanda HillisSocial Media, Communications
Mum to two busy boys - one at Queen Alexandra and one who just started Van tech. Amanda is very active in the community: a PAC co-chair, DPAC executive, volunteer with the Grandview-Woodland Community Policing Centre, and founding member of PAN. In her spare time, she is a freelance photographer and graphic designer.
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Andrea SinclairMedia Representative
Long-time Vancouver resident, Community Builder, Local Entrepreneur, PAC Chair at Charles Dickens Elementary School, and a founding Member of the Parent Advocacy Network for Public Education. But most importantly, mother of twins in elementary school.
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Carrie BercicSteering Committee
Carrie believes that a strong, healthy, fully-funded, equitable public education system is essential to both the individual and collective well-being of our society and the citizens within it. Carrie is mother to two children that have navigated their way through the public school system. As Chair of Friends of the School Library (FOSL), she lobbies all levels of governmet for better school library funding, more full-time teacher-librarians, and equitable library access for all students. She is also a member of both Families Against Cuts to Education (FACE) and The Public Education Project.
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Corine WillemsMedia Representative
An active volunteer in her West End community, and one of the founding members of the Education Advocacy Committee at her children's elementary school. She is committed to encouraging more citizens to fight for a stronger and better funded public education system.
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Erica JaafSteering Committee
I’m a parent to two marvelous, compassionate, funny kids in public school; a data manager supporting HIV clinical trials; an avid reader, for pleasure and edification. Only recently have I turned my attention and energy to public education as I watch the erosion of BC kids’ learning environments from the front row.
I believe another world is possible and strive for it every day. |
Galen HutchesonSteering Committee
Galen Hutcheson is an artist who colours outside the lines. She has worked in art, communications & facilitation in schools, prisons & community development. Presently Galen in a Co-Chair of her school PAC & spends her exhaling time juggling her 3 elementary school children. Galen's most relevant passion lies in the social justice inherent in public education advocacy & the desire to rebuild an inclusive & engaging learning environment for all children.
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Jennifer StewartMedia Representative
Born and raised in Vancouver, Jennifer is a former lawyer who proofreads non-fiction books when she is not busy chasing her two small children or standing up for public education on behalf of PAN and Families Against Cuts to Education, another advocacy group that she co-founded.
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Jin MalmSteering Committee
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Kim WerkerSocial Media
A native New Yorker, Kim works as a writer and editor, a workshop facilitator, a content marketer, and a camp counsellor for grownups who want to get (back) in touch with their creativity. A life-long believer in the importance of a strong public-education system, she's co-chair of the PAC at her son's school in addition to sitting on the steering committee of PAN.
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Maggie Milne MartensSteering Committee
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Melanie AntweilerSteering Committee
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