Holly Dickinson for Townshipt Trustee

Because the work of the last four years is not finished, and I have so much more advocacy work I want to accomplish. Langley is growing faster than almost any district in the province, and every school we secure now is a classroom a child sits in five years from now. Sites, funding, and construction all move slowly, and somebody has to keep pushing at every stage.

I’m also proud of how this Board learned to work together, and I’d rather spend the next term building on that rather than starting over. Our graduation rates sit above the provincial average, which is worth saying out loud. We still have gaps to close on completion rates for Indigenous students, students in care, and students with diverse abilities and that’s the work I want to finish.

I grew up here. I was raised in Brookswood, attending Langley public schools from kindergarten through Grade 12, including Brookswood Secondary. I spent most of my childhood on a field or a court somewhere in this community. Langley is, and always has been, home to me.

Over the past four years it’s been my honour to serve the same system that gave me my education.

Eight things I’ll keep pushing for:

• New schools, funded ahead of the growth. Continued advocacy for construction in Willoughby and our other fast-growing communities, so capacity arrives with the neighbourhood rather than years behind it.
• Completion rates that rise for every student. Focused work on graduation and completion for Indigenous students, youth in care, and students with diverse abilities.
• Mental health support students can reach. Easily accessible counselling and mental health resources in schools.
• Inclusive education funded to the real need. A provincial funding model where support for students with intensive needs reflects the level of support those students actually require.
• Newcomer and English Language Learner students supported. Targeted funding so schools receiving newcomer and refugee students have the staffing and resources those classrooms need.
• Recruiting and keeping good staff. Teachers, education assistants and support staff are the heart of the district. Hiring well, supporting people early in their careers, and giving them reasons to stay.
• Careful stewardship of public dollars. Budgets that hold up over years, capital plans that account for what a building costs to run, and reports out before the vote so families can follow the reasoning.
• A Board that works together. Trustees who can disagree on an item and still get to a decision, because a Board that functions well is worth protecting.

Simon Fraser University and a Bachelor of Education from the University of British Columbia, and I’ve taught elementary school in the Surrey School District since 2012. Before teaching I worked in human resources managing unionized employees, including recruiting more than a thousand workers, many of them to staff an Olympic venue during the 2010 Winter Games.

On the Board I’ve served as Vice-Chair, and I represent Langley on the BC School Trustees Association Provincial Council, the Langley Local Immigration Partnership, and the District’s 2SLGBTQ+ committee.

The clearest measure is space for students. Since September 2024 this Board has opened or secured provincial approval for 5,030 new student spaces, roughly $514.5 million in provincial investment, including three new schools and the joint stɑtl̓əw̓ Middle School and Emery Dosdall Secondary campus in Willoughby.

Getting there took advocacy. In 2025 I brought forward a motion calling on the province to reconsider its response to Langley’s capital plan and fund the schools we had identified as priorities. I advanced two successful resolutions to the BCSTA: one for targeted federal funding to support newcomer and refugee students who are English Language Learners, and one to change B.C.’s inclusive education funding model so that funding for students with intensive needs better matches the support they actually require.

Being a trustee isn’t only about voting on what arrives in front of you. Part of the job is pushing other levels of government when the system isn’t giving our students what they need.

Every Board decision I vote on, I see land the next morning. Not in a report six months later. In a classroom, on a Tuesday, with actual students in it. That changes what questions you ask before you vote.

Trustees in British Columbia can’t be employed by the district they govern, which is why I teach in Surrey rather than here. But a classroom is a classroom. When a report describes a staffing ratio or a support model or a school over capacity, I know exactly what that looks like at nine in the morning, and I know which part of it will work and which part will land on a teacher to absorb.

Something simple. I like being around children and watching them work out who they are. It’s a special moment when a concept finally clicks for a student. It’s magical to watch, and after fourteen years the magic still hasn’t worn off.

That’s also why I ran for the board. The thing that drew me into teaching is the same thing that drives the trustee work: building places where children feel supported, find what they’re good at, and get a real chance at it. Every student deserves the opportunity to learn, belong and thrive, and that belief is behind every vote I take.

More than people expect. I managed unionized employees and recruited more than a thousand workers, a good number of them to staff an Olympic venue during the 2010 Games. That work teaches you what it takes to hire well at scale, what a collective agreement means in practice, and what happens operationally when a decision made at a table lands on the people doing the work.

The school district is the largest employer in this community, and most of its budget is people. When a report comes forward on staffing, recruitment, or labour relations, I read it with that background, and I ask what it will mean for the person on the receiving end of it.

It means capacity is always a daunting conversation. This district now serves roughly 27,600 students across 46 school sites, and neighbourhoods like Willoughby keep growing. A family moving into a new home wants to know their child will have a desk in a school, in their catchment.

The progress in getting so many new spaces here is something I’m proud of, but we cannot let up. A district growing at this rate has to be at the front of the line for new school builds every single year, and that only happens if we build positive relationships with the members of government who have the ability to grant us the seats we need. Unfortunately the reality is that in politics relationships matter just as much as demonstrating a need.

Because too many kids are suffering. Because I’ve lived through the devastation of kids not getting the help they need. Because we have the power to change the trajectory of a life.

If we want students to learn, belong and thrive, then the right mental health supports have to be in the building, and they have to be reachable and without stigmatization.

Because we share the same priorities, ones I’ve already spent four years working on: sustained advocacy for new schools, careful stewardship of public dollars, and a Board that can work together. Working alongside people who share those commitments is more effective than working alone.

What doesn’t change is how I vote. Every member of this team keeps their own judgment on every item, and I keep mine. I’ll still read the full package, still ask the uncomfortable question, and still vote the way I believe serves students.

Bring me the question. I would rather hear a concern early than read about it after a decision is made. You won’t always get the answer you were hoping for, but you’re owed a real one, you’re owed the reasoning behind it, and you’re owed the respect of being treated as someone with a legitimate stake in your child’s education.

Education works best when the student, parent, and school all work together - and I’m here to listen if you feel something isn’t working.

A fair bit of my year still runs on the school calendar. I’ve organized my school’s Terry Fox Run for more than a decade, and I’ve led its Christmas hamper drive for the past ten years, which has put more than 150 hampers directly into the hands of families in our school community and contributed donations that helped hundreds more through the Cloverdale Community Kitchen.

The hamper drive is the part of the year I wouldn’t give up. You find out very quickly which families are one bad month away from trouble, and you find out that everybody else wants to help once somebody organizes it. That is most of what governing is, too.

The rest is Langley. I’m usually out enjoying live music, shopping at the small businesses that give this place its character, or walking my dog on one of the amazing trails in our town.