Craig Smiley has been elected to serve a 13th non-consecutive year as Chair of the Border Land School Division (BLSD) Board of Trustees.

"I was honoured the Board picked me again...it's a fantastic board to work with," said Smiley after his election at Wednesday's organizational meeting.

While he says COVID-19 remains the Board's most pressing issue at the moment, Smiley admits he's looking forward to resuming some of the good work that was happening in BLSD before the pandemic hit, including literacy and numeracy coaching.

"I still think we have to get back to education, period. We were doing a lot of good things and we need to keep doing those," he said.

As well, Smiley anticipates the eventual release of the province's education review results which were also delayed due to COVID-19.

Meantime, he applauds the BLSD administration team who he says has worked tirelessly to make plans to get the schools back up-and-running for the start of the new school year against the COVID-19 backdrop.

"(They've) done a wonderful job...I know a lot didn't have summer holidays this year, they worked pretty much all summer...and I really really appreciate that," added Smiley.

Also at Wednesday's organizational meeting, Patty Wiebe was re-elected Vice Chair of the board, and Jake Fehr re-elected 2nd Vice Chair.