Here at Waterloo Catholic Teachers we understand that not everyone shares our view of education. We cannot ignore other opinions and we are not giving credit to these articles. We believe that it is important to be aware of what is being said about teachers like you, your classrooms, and the programs you provide.
We set up this section of the website for you to see how teachers and schoolboards are sometimes portrayed in the media. Take it all with a grain of salt! All political parties have their media favourites and the Conservatives have always used newspapers like the Toronto Sun to spread their message. We want to offer as much information as possible as we delve further into murky water!
Thanks for visiting!
OECTA STATEMENT ON BARGAINING
OECTA, OSSTF REACT TO LECCE “AMATEUR-HOUR” NEWS CONFERENCE ON CLASS SIZES, E-LEARNING
Education minister asks MPP Sara Singh and school board to ‘stop fearmongering’
On May 16, Brampton Centre MPP Sara Singh asked Education Minister Lisa Thompson to address the Peel District School Board (PDSB) trustees’ open letter on the cancellation of secondary courses.
During question period of legislation Singh restated the PDSB board of trustees’ concerns on the impact the Ontario government’s cuts and larger class size will have on students in Brampton and the Peel Region.
Singh added that, according to the board, students would have limited or no elective courses, leading to a “significant, negative impact on some subject areas” and that “for certain students, these types of courses are key to their … engagement in school … (and decreased engagement) … is directly linked to student achievement … and their ability to graduate.”
Minister Thompson Calls on Teachers’ Unions to Start Negotiations
April 30, 2019
TORONTO — Today, Lisa Thompson, Minister of Education, issued the following statement in response to the start of education sector labour negotiations:
“Our government took the unprecedented step this month of providing teachers’ unions with an opportunity to start early good faith bargaining to allow labour negotiations to conclude in time to ensure our students will be in classes, where they belong, in September. The current education sector labour agreement negotiated by the previous government expires on August 31, 2019, which coincides with the start of the fall school year. We believe this is unacceptable. Our government will be considering changing the expiry date of future education sector labour agreements to a different time of year to minimize any disruption to students’ ability to attend class.
Education Minister Lisa Thompson calls teacher unions ‘irresponsible’ for not bargaining early
Education Minister Lisa Thompson says education unions are being “irresponsible” for not coming to the bargaining table early.
Apart from Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation (OSSTF), no other unions have served notice to bargain.
But the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association accused Thompson of playing games, saying there’s no point in starting negotiations while the ministry continues to hold consultations on issues such as class size.
Thompson said Tuesday that “we thought it would be proactive to invite our labour partners to come to the table” to give them “an opportunity to start early good faith bargaining to allow labour negotiations to conclude in time to ensure our students will be in classes, where they belong, in September.”
Kelly McParland: What Ford can learn from past battles with Ontario’s powerful teachers
For her homework today, we assign Ontario Education Minister Lisa Thompson “For the Love of Learning,” the report of the 1993 Royal Commission on Education ordered up by then-premier Bob Rae to address the perceived crisis afflicting elementary and secondary schools in the province.
The value of the report is in its often prescient views on the whole issue of education and the seemingly eternal need to judge it in crisis. It notes right off that (then) recent history had seen a Conservative government formulate “major reviews of several key aspects of education,” which had barely begun implementation when a Liberal government “started its own reappraisals and changes,” followed by Rae’s New Democratic Party government, which launched the commission with an eye to fundamental reforms.
Doug Ford says Ontario student protests about ‘union thugs,’ not class sizes
Ontario Premier Doug Ford is linking a province-wide student protest over education reform to the influence of teachers’ union “thugs.”
Ford made the comments during an interview with the John Oakley Show on Global News Radio 640 Toronto on Thursday.
He said a lot of parents and students were disappointed by the protests, which saw high school students across the province walk out of class.
“This isn’t about class sizes, gentlemen,” he told a panel of guests on the show.
“This is strictly from the union thugs, as I call them, the teachers’ union, one of the most powerful unions in the entire country. There’s finally a government with a backbone that wants our kids to start learning math.”
Peter Shawn Taylor: Increasing class size doesn’t mean students will suffer
“Be the change you want to see in the world.”
How often have you seen that or similar slogans pinned to classroom bulletin boards and taped to homeroom doors?
Teachers, it seems, are always encouraging their students to embrace change, challenge the status quo and seek out new ways of doing things. Change is good! Change is inevitable!
Except, of course, when it comes to changing anything to do with teachers themselves. Then change is Bad, Bad, Bad.
That’s the unmistakable response from teachers and their unions regarding the provincial government’s recently announced school reforms to e-learning and class size.
EXCLUSIVE: New Ontario math curriculum goes back to the basics
Elementary school students will go back to the basics when it comes to math, teachers can count on new training and parents should plan on receiving additional tools to help their kids with math homework.
This is all part of a major overhaul of Ontario’s failing math curriculum.
The full curriculum overhaul will be unveiled by Education Minister Lisa Thompson in coming days, but the strategy is laid out in documents obtained by the Toronto Sun.
BLIZZARD: Doug Ford aims to make full-day kindergarten more affordable
Deep breaths, everyone.
Relax.
Premier Doug Ford is not – I repeat NOT – going to slash your babysitting, aka full-day kindergarten (FDK).
That was a certainty even before Education Minister Lisa Thompson’s statement late Friday that the government was, “absolutely committed to full day learning for four and five year olds across the province.”
LILLEY: When it comes to education, we keep paying more but getting less
What if you were paying more than double the price for a product or service than you used to but the product or service just didn’t deliver the way it used to, the quality wasn’t there. Would you keep paying?
That is what we are being asked to do when it comes to education in this province.
Over the course of the Liberal years in power, spending on education more than doubled, the number of teachers went up even as enrollment dropped significantly, and test scores declined.