Retiring teachers will leave 40 vacant full-time teaching positions in School District 57 schools, but only half of those jobs will be filled by next September, due to insufficient government funding, says Prince George District Teachers Association president Matt Pearce.
In Pearce's estimation, 20 teaching positions will be eliminated for the 2013-14 school year, twice the number he says is justified by declining student enrollment. The district anticipates 240 fewer students next school year.
"If we'd lost the number of teaching position according to the enrollment decline it would have been about 10 positions, but the real loss is 20 positions," said Pearce, who made his concerns known to trustees in Tuesday's public school board meeting.
Pearce said there will be some adjustments once the board knows how many teachers will be leaving their jobs temporarily on sabbaticals, medical leaves and maternity leaves, but he said that likely won't restore any of the 20 lost positions. Staffing levels won't be finalized until late September.
SD 57 superintendent Brian Pepper could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Pearce blames the province for not keeping pace with the rest of the country in student funding. Compared to the national average, B.C. consistently ranks near the bottom of the country, offering $1,000 less per student than the national average.
"If we were just at the Canadian average, we would have $13 million more for our students this coming year than we do," said Pearce. "That would be incredible in terms of what we could do for our vulnerable learners. We could give every kid in our district a laptop and have money to spare or have an extra teacher or two in every school. But we don't have that money. Apparently we are a have-not province in terms of public education."
Meanwhile, the current provincial teachers' contract expires Sunday.
On Tuesday, the province announced it has asked representatives of the B.C. Public School Employers' Association to break off talks with the B.C. Teachers Federation and leave the provincial bargaining table. Education Minister Peter Fassbender has appointed Peter Cameron as the government's negotiator, instead of BCPSEA, which represents school trustees.
Up to this week, Pearce said significant progress had been made due to the framework agreement between BCPSEA and BCTF, put in place last year, and the work of arbitrator Mark Brown.
"We've been undergoing five months of successful negotiations, in fact, on Friday the two parties had agreed on a new process for expedited arbitration that will save the districts and the union a great deal of money and resolve matters quicker," said Pearce. "That's evidence they were bargaining quite successfully and now the government has ended that by ordering BCPSEA negotiators away from the table. If something's not broken, why intervene?"
