School District 36 Surrey
School district in British Columbia, Canada
School District 36 Surrey operates schools in Surrey, White Rock, and Barnston Island, British Columbia. It is the largest school district in British Columbia, with 80,208 students and 195+ languages represented during the 2022–23 school year. District 36 includes 103 elementary schools, 21 secondary schools, 5 learning centres, and 3 adult education centres. While the district was established in 1906, its first school opened in 1882. The district is Surrey’s largest employer with 12,540 employees including 6,716 teachers.
Administration
The Surrey School District's administration hub is the District Education Centre, which was officially opened on September 11, 2011.
Schools
Elementary schools
Secondary schools and other programs
Budget
For the first time in history, the Surrey Board of Education passed an annual budget totalling more than a billion dollars for the 2023–24 school year consisting of $602 million for teacher costs and $451 million for all other costs. The largest sources of funds are $945 million in provincial government grants, $17 million in tuition, $9 million in investment income, $4 million in rental and lease income, and $3 million in federal grants.
In the news
The Surrey School District was reported in the national news numerous times during the 1990s and 2000s, most notably for its stand on social issues.
Overcrowding
Surrey had 361 portable classrooms in use by the end of the 2022–23 school year.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “School District 36 Surrey” is school district in British Columbia, Canada. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through School, District and Surrey, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “school district in British Columbia, Canada” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7432185. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2022, 1906, 1882 and 2011.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “School District 36 Surrey”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow School District 36 Surrey primary sources, School District 36 Surrey archive and School research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “School District 36 Surrey”?
- What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
- Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “School District 36 Surrey” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.