School District 57 clerical workers are struggling to keep up with the extra work created by the province's "painfully slow" new student information system, MyEducationBC, trustees heard Tuesday.
Karen Wong, president of CUPE 3742, said reports from her members show the system was not ready for use.
"Unfortunately they have reached a wall of frustration with MyEdBC," said Wong, whose union represents more than 800 district workers.
"These people are experienced, highly competent clerical workers. We truly believe our members comments must be heard."
The $95 million data management system replaced BCeSIS, a system that was also roundly criticized and plagued school workers with start-up problems.
Wong read comments from the workers about their experience with MyEdBC, widely described as cumbersome, time-consuming and poorly organized. Speed and accuracy are a problem.
"MyEdBC is slow to the point of total frustration," said one worker.
Another described how each click of the mouse, creates a long pause.
Yet another said implementing data on one student can take eight minutes. It took two hours for one person to input attendance information.
Another said in the old system, for discipline they could input up to 25 student letters, but now they can only get through four. Timetables take too long to print.
"It's faster to run down the hallway and locate a child in 1,100 kids than to access info on MyEdBC," said one worker.
If the system were a used car, said one commenter, it would be a lemon.
Accessing emergency contact may be an issue should the system go down. Workers said a student's doctor is more likely to appear first for a student, and the system makes users click through multiple screens before they can get to parent contact information.
Wong listed numerous staff who had logged more than 20 hours of overtime trying to input data and wondered aloud who should be responsible for those added costs.
Many said they are far behind the other work.
"With all the extra work, it's hard to fulfill all my extra duties," read one comment. "We want our schools to function well, but these are circumstances are beyond our control."
Others called for help.
"We can't do this alone," Wong read.
"I'm drowning in paperwork and there isn't enough time in the day."
The only positive comments came in support of the training staff tasked with helping implement the cumbersome system.
In response, trustees passed a motion to send a letter to the Ministry of Education about the program "and the extra burden, cost and workload for district staff."
"I really don't know how to respond," said chairperson Tony Cable after Wong's presentation.
"That was quite a powerful report," said Cable who, like Wong, praised the staff for their extra work.
Trustee Brenda Hooker said it's not fair the district pay for the poor performance.
"All of those costs are currently a burden of the district," noted Hooker.
"And yet (the province) has passed us a program that has flaws."
