HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1996-04-24, Page 1610 +4e GST 650 Vol. 12 No 17 Wednesday, April 24, 1996
... was the code phrase for F.E. Madill students, Wingham, who took part in what was to
have been a province-wide walkout of secondary school students on Friday. The protest
was over the inequities of provincial cuts to education that negatively impact rural schools
which already spend at lower levels than many urban ones. Over 1,000 young people
demonstrated against the cuts that could decrease the numbers of students able to
participate in extra-curricular activities. Another problem may be the payment of an
increased user fee for textbooks and supplies.
Feature
Volunteers, the
spark to keep
communities alive
See page 6
Sports
2 former Bulldogs
help Hawks glide
to championship
See page 8
Special
6 pages of tips to
get your car in
shape for spring
See page 11
Board of
Education sets
budget
See page 27
itizen 3 year freeze on wages
OSSTF agreement has
Teachers ratify
The Huron County Board of
Education has reached a collective
agreement with the Huron Branch
(District 45) of the Ontario
Secondary School Teacher's
Federation (OSSTF) for the next
three school years. The agreement,
which expires in August 1999, calls
for a wage freeze for teachers for
the life of the contract but has job
security provisions that will lead to
no layoffs of teaching staff in place
as of Jan. 1, 1996. All restructuring
will be accomplished through
regular retirement and other
attrition of staff.
The tentative agreement was
ratified by the Huron County Board
of Education at a special board
meeting Tuesday, April 16 and by
the Secondary School Teachers at a
special general meeting Thursday,
April 18.
John Clarke, federation officer
for OSSTF-District 45 said, "The
Huron County Board of Education
and OSSTF District 45 have
bargained in good faith leading to a
labour agreement for the next three
years which is fair to Huron County
taxpayers, the Huron County Board
of Education and Huron's secon-
dary teachers. Most importantly,
the agreement restructures the
schools in a way that limits the
impact of provincial government
cuts on the students in the
classroom. It guarantees that all of
our current teachers will be
available to continue delivering a
high quality of service in Huron
County public secondary school
classrooms."
Jeanne Dionne, Human
Resources Administrator for the
Huron County Board of Education
said, "This agreement verifies that
when employer and employee
groups sit down together to solve
problems, joint solutions which
benefit both parties can be found.
Our current staff is pleased to have
an assurance that they will have
jobs for the next three years. The
downizing needed over that period
of time to meet the board's
requirements (given the certain
government grant reductions) will
be accomplished through regl)lar
employee turnover. The agreement
also involved structural changes to
the positions of responsibility in the
secondary schools which
incorporate current curriculum
initiatives to the benefit of the
students."
Judy Cairncross, president of
OSSTF-District 45 stated, "Win-
win Bargaining is rare in negotia-
tions, but in this case both sides
worked together as a team in an
attempt to solve the budgetary
problems downloaded by the
provincial government to the Huron
County Board of Education. All
parties are happy with the agree-
ment because it preserves Huron
Public secondary school programs
for students to the greatest extent
possible in a time of government
cutbacks."
Board Chair, Roxanne Brown
said, "This agreement sets a
direction to restructure secondary
education in a realistic way. The
Board has a financial problem.
OSSTF has a job security concern.
We have found ways to meet both
needs."
Director of Education, Paul
Carroll expressed satisfaction that
this approach sets the stage for
further discussion and decision
making to meet significant funding
short falls in the next two year
period.
The Huron County Board of
Education operates six secondary
schools and 24 elementary schools
in Huron County. OSSTF, founded
in 1919 has 50,000 members across
Ontario and approximately 267
secondary school teaching
members in Huron County.
MPP hopes for patience on education funding changes
By Bonnie Gropp
If Blyth and supporting munici-
palities follow through on their
threat to withhold collection of
education taxes as of Jan. 1, who
will pay the price?
In response to Blyth's move to
have the provincial government
take education off property tax,
MPP Helen Johns says that while
she is glad to see someone ques-
tioning and seeking action with
regards to the way education is
presently funded, she does have
one major concern. "Government is
going to look at this issue and will
move quickly, but if they can't find
a solution by the time (of this dead-
line) I'm concerned that the chil-
dren may suffer.
At the April 15 meeting of Blyth
council Councillor Rob Lawrie
noted that if support for the Blyth
recommendation continued to grow
at the current rate it would literally
"cripple the system with the first
payment."
"Who will this affect? Who will
be hurt?" queried Johns.
Blyth Reeve Mason Bailey says
he believes it won't come to this. "I
think if enough municipalites come
across with their support, the gov-
ernment will have to move. Our
intent is that it will affect most of
the school boards, so they in turn
will pressure the government,
which will then realize they have to
do something."
Director of Education Paul Cai-
roll says that he isn't troubled by
the Blyth objective, saying that the
"reality is they are challenging the
system. If (the protest) can move
the effort to change funding for-
ward I'm all for it."
Carroll said his impression, fol-
lowing a speech made at a recent
board gathering by Blyth Reeve
Mason Bailey, was that the trustees
were generally in favour of the
move as well. "I didn't sense any
negativity from them."
Johns acknowledges that there
are less provincial dollars being
spent on education in Huron than in
other areas of Ontario, a fact that is
not lost on others at Queen's Park.
She mentioned the remarks of Edu-
cation Minister John Snobelen dur-
ing an April 9 debate on education.
He stated, "There is certainly a dif-
ference in the way school boards
across the province are funded. As
a matter of fact, there is consider-
able difference in the cost or the
amount of money boards spend per
student on education in this
province, from a low of under
$5,000 per student to over $7,000
per student in some of our more
high-spending boards."
"Our commitment, which was
mentioned in the finance minister's
statement on Nov. 29, and which
was reified only a few weeks ago is
to make sure that our system
becomes more equitable in how we
fund education in this province. We
are in negotiation now and having
conversations with our so-called
negative grant boards, boards that
receive more industrial and com-
mercial tax revenue than other
boards do across this province.
What we want to do is to allow the
province to enter into conversations
with all of those boards with the
purpose — and I assume this would
be the purpose of the members
opposite too — of having a fair and
equitable education system in the
province of Ontario, one that's fair
for every student in this province."
Johns said, "The issue here is tax
reform throughout the province."
The fact that this will affect farm
tax rebate, education and commer-
cial tax, means that it is too monu-
mental an issue to move too
quickly on. "I'd love to see it
change tomorrow, but it is going to
take time. We're going to do some-
thing, but I'm asking them to give
us time."
Johns acknowledged the chang-
ing face of education and the need
to better educate students in prepa-
ration for the future. Young people
are aware of the difficulties and are
trying to make their concerns
known as well. On Friday approxi-
mately 1,000 students of F.E.
Madill walked out to protest the
inequities of education cuts to rural
schools over urban ones, said Stu-
dent Council Advisor Dee Graham
Student Council President Car-
olyn Pike, told students of the
Continued on page 22