A provincial teacher shortage will have less of an impact in the Comox Valley than in other parts of British Columbia, according to the president of the local teachers’ association.
While there are currently more than 400 teaching positions that need to be filled in Vancouver, Surrey, Prince George and other districts across the province, the same cannot be said for School District 71.
Comox District Teachers’ Association president Nick Moore said the hiring crunch will not affect local schools. According to Moore, there are about 70 more teachers registered to teach this fall in the Valley than there were last year — an increase of about 15 per cent.
Moore said one reason could be that teachers are attracted by the thought of living and working in the Comox Valley.
“We are a little bit unique. A lot of the big lower mainland places are having troubles and up north they’re having troubles. But here in the Comox Valley, everyone wants to come live here,” he said. “This is the once-in-a-career opportunity to move to the place you want to move to.”
He said many of the new teachers have actually come from the areas currently facing a shortage.
“There was a month where I was taking calls from Langley, Surrey, the north Island,” he said. “I’d say half of the new jobs were taken by people coming from outside the Comox Valley.”
The teacher shortage in B.C. is the result of a Supreme Court of Canada decision last November in a long-standing court battle between the B.C. Teachers’ Federation (BCTF) and the provincial government.
The ruling reinstated language into the BCTF’s collective agreement on class sizes and composition requirements, something that was taken away in 2002.
Moore estimates the government was saving $250 million per year before the Supreme Court’s ruling. The province reached an agreement with the BCTF this January to provide school districts with an extra $50 million for hiring teachers.
“Once that language went back in, the classes had to be smaller and they have to hire a certain number of learning assistants, counsellors, librarians. The reinstatement of that language meant they had to hire a lot more people,” said Moore.
There are 460 full-time equivalent teachers in School District 71 and more than 200 substitute teachers.
