Teachers walking out tomorrow

[papasmerf]

seems to me the union might be adding to the decline in education.

 

[thesun]

Perhaps but the board as well as it should be deligent when they hire new teachers. Like sports, sometimes when you draft, the player may turn out to be a dud.

 

[God]

Now this has to suck for parents that paid for daycare and had to take time of work. Schools opened this morning and teachers were forced to work. This was done at 4 am, jezz.



Parents were left scrambling – and upset – after a last-minute decision by GTA school boards to open their doors to students today, after a planned day-long walkout by elementary teachers was ruled illegal.
And on a surreal day when parents of nearly 1 million Ontario elementary children learned only at breakfast that most schools were actually open, all the usual rules and procedures went out the window.
Not quite half the usual 630 students had shown up by 9 a.m. at Toronto’s Maurice Cody Public School, with some groaning at principal Andrew Howard when they arrived: “Why couldn't you make it a PA day?”
[SIZE=+2]•[/SIZE] RELATED:Teacher’s fight belongs in court, not the classroom, says McGuinty

Not my call, responded Howard, who was dressed in jeans and a work shirt because he originally thought classes would be cancelled.
“So I sent an email to parents this morning when I learned school was back on, and we opened our phones at 7:30 instead of 8 so parents could talk to a person,” he said.
Many parents expressed anger at the last-minute notice. The province’s labour relations board made the ruling just before 4 a.m. this morning, followed by an about-face by the Toronto District School Board, which had initially said schools would remain closed to students, but later announced they’d be open.

At Williamson Road Public School in Toronto’s Beaches neighbourhood, families were rushing to get there before the bell rang.
“It’s just been a fiasco,” said Carolyn Frail, who scampered to school with her two children, Colin and Brynna King.
“The union, (elementary teacher union president) Sam Hammond, is holding everyone hostage. He’s holding the parents hostage; he’s holding the students hostage. … If they have a problem with the government they should sort it out themselves.”

Gord McClean, a stay-at-home dad, said he planned to take his three kids to the Ontario Science Centre and watch movies today, until he learned on the radio before 7 a.m. that class was in session. McClean expected a lot of kids not to make it to school.
“I got a feeling you’re going to goof off all day,” he told his children. “It’s certainly quieter out on the street today.”
Bernie Fields, a mother with four kids, was relieved to be able to drop two of them off at school.

“Entertaining four kids would have been difficult,” she laughed. “Like seriously, go back to school.”
At Maurice Cody, some 60 parents had called by 9 a.m. to say they were keeping their children home – about 10 per cent of the enrolment.
“It's a school day, so they should be in school, but this situation is frustrating; we've got to move on” said Robert Beaudin, after dropping his Grade 4 son at school. Wife Dianne called the situation “unbelievable. We have a fabulous relationship with our child's teacher, but this last one (Friday's planned walkout) was frustrating.”

Mark Schultz dropped his son off at junior kindergarten but said he felt “bad for parents who scrambled to make other arrangements, who maybe had in-laws drive in from out of town to look after their kids. I'm off today, so it wouldn't have mattered for us.”
When Jaimie Cowles told her 5-year-old daughter Hanna school was on, the Grade 1 student was happy “because my best friend is in my class.”
Ann-Marie Finney dropped her son to junior kindergarten and said “I'm happy school is on but this has been very disorganized.”

Kelly Gorman gave her Grade 1 daughter the choice of coming to school or not “and she wanted to come. But I'd like to see this thing resolved.”
Niki Scott, who hires a nanny to take care of her four kids while she and her husband are at work, was frustrated that the teacher’s dispute with the government is still affecting her family.
“We need to fix this broken school system,” said Scott, whose children attend Williamson Road.

“I’m all for the teachers, but families can’t keep laying out expenses for this,” she said, adding that there were only “like seven kids” in her son’s class.
Robert Gordon, arriving late and exasperated with his 5-year-old daughter Mairi, said it was difficult convincing his kids they had to go to school Friday morning after they went to bed expecting a day off.
“I’ve got three kids. One of them was right out the door, one of them is grudgingly going and the other one is still at home and might not go to school today because he’s so mad,” said Gordon. “I’m very frustrated with the TDSB.”

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/ar...caught-off-guard-as-schools-unexpectedly-open

 

[papasmerf]

Perhaps but the board as well as it should be deligent when they hire new teachers. Like sports, sometimes when you draft, the player may turn out to be a dud.

and perhaps it is the tenured teachers who fall behind the standards.

 

[train]

Honestly Rawd, what is needed is pay flexibility, to reward the best teachers and dismiss the worst. Many of these teachers have bachelor and master degrees. One of my coworkers used to be a teacher and he said to me, I work as half as hard when I was a teacher and get paid more for it. Furthermore, no BS from parents, kids, etc.

The union went beserk when Harris wanted to bring in teacher testing. They barely tolerate uniform student teasting and school rankings. So you know that teacher merit determining salary is never going to happen. If it was based on merit rather than seniority (i.e. just staying alive) I think that people would be okay with the current wage level. As we know, merit pay goes against everthing organized labour stands for.

The Ontario teachers are already the highest paid teachers in the country. It was my feeling that this strike was more about the clawback of the insane number of bankable sick days they had under the old contract.

 

[Dan]

The Ontario teachers are already the highest paid teachers in the country. It was my feeling that this strike was more about the clawback of the insane number of bankable sick days they had under the old contract.

Knowing quite a few teachers and listening to them yak about it, it's not the clawing back of the sick days or the removal of the accumulating clause but it's wiping the bank out of previously earned sick days which if you think about it isn't fair. It's like having a pension and then before retiring the employer saying sorry, we changed our mind.

 

[train]

Knowing quite a few teachers and listening to them yak about it, it's not the clawing back of the sick days or the removal of the accumulating clause but it's wiping the bank out of previously earned sick days which if you think about it isn't fair. It's like having a pension and then before retiring the employer saying sorry, we changed our mind.

Ignoring the "sick-day bank", the teachers already have the best pension of anyone other than politicians, they don't need to double-dip.

 

[thesun]

Here we go again, teachers being attacked.