It’s going to be complex.
There are a lot of reasons for BC teachers to feel optimistic about the $50 million interim settlement coming from the Ministry of Education, but the Kootenay Lake School Board doesn’t know yet exactly how much the district will get or what it will be used for.
In November the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in favour of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation in a long-standing dispute over class size and composition, and this initial payment is intended to bridge the gap financially until the Ministry of Education can strategize how to come up with a longer term solution.
Superintendent Jeff Jones called it “a gesture of good faith from the province.”
Kootenay Lake Teachers’ Federation president Paul Boscariol told the Star he and Creston’s Doug Kunzelman will be meeting soon with Jones and human resources director Deanna Holitzki to hash out the details of where and how to allocate the coming funds.
Boscariol ballparks the number of positions potentially coming to SD8 at eight or nine, but isn’t sure yet which schools these positions will end up at, nor what type of jobs they will be. And Jones said the priority will be putting teachers in supportive roles rather than creating new classes.
“We don’t want undue disruption in our schools. The schools have already established their classes, relationships have been formed,” he said.
“This should be seen as an opportunity to break out students who need special support in math, or maybe introducing an additional teacher in the school to support literacy if that’s a challenge. There’s also special needs students, who are of critical importance.”
He’d also like to see attention paid to “the students who are more able, and how it is we challenge them with rigour in their programs.”
According to the interim settlement, the funds will be go towards creating teaching positions across the province for speech language pathologists, behaviour intervention specialists, school psychologists, aboriginal support workers, mental health counsellors and English as a second language teachers.
The news comes amidst concerns, expressed by Sheri Walsh of the District Parent Advisory Council at Tuesday evening’s board meeting, that L.V. Rogers continues to experience over-crowding and has been unable to fill some key teaching positions.
Walsh reiterated concerns that Nelson high school students are on waitlists for classes they need to graduate and are increasingly resorting to online or distance education to fill the gap.
She pointed out her own daughter is in that category.
“This is creating a lot of anxiety,” she told the board, urging them to act as quickly as possible to funnel new teaching resources in the direction of Nelson’s high school, a request seconded by teacher representative Sherry Lynn McGregor.
Advocates hope some of the staffing can be allocated to the high school before the start of the second semester in February. But Jones said the issue at L.V. Rogers is a hiring problem, not a financial one, as there are two current vacancies that the school is struggling to fill.
At the board meeting on Tuesday Jones reminded everyone that the process of allocating the funds both province-wide and within the district will be multi-faceted and may take longer than some hope.
“At this time we do not have instructions about what the next steps are, nor do we know how the funds will be allocated,” he said.
“But we do look forward to working with you all, and talking about how that this will affect staffing in our district.”
One element in the mix: the Supreme Court ruling is intended to restore staffing levels to the level they were at in 2002, but these days there are significantly fewer students in the district.
“It’s all about ratios,” said Boscariol. “It gets pretty complicated.”
But the time to act is now, he said.
“We want to get this process rolling, get these postings out there and let the school district go through the vetting process so we can get these people hired.
“We want teachers in place as soon as possible, for the benefit of the kids.”
