Editor:
It should be of concern to all taxpayers when governments needlessly duplicate services and create expensive bureaucracies while at the same time pressuring our educational system with “fiscal restraint.” But that’s what the Education Statutes Amendment Act – Bill 11 amounts to. While one of its professed purposes is to hold school boards to greater accountability, it also seeks to waste precious resources in pursuit of greater control over teacher professional development. Many of us – teachers, trustees, and citizens – ask, “Why bother?”
In School District No. 46 teachers are engaged in a wide variety of professional development activities year round – not just on PD days. Teachers belong to their Local Specialist Associations (local branches of Provincial Specialist Associations, or PSAs) and along with meeting locally and organizing their own activities, they attend their annual PSA conferences.
Primary teachers, counsellors, secondary science teachers, P.E. teachers, and many others undertake this form of professional learning on a year-round basis. Other teachers work on masters degrees, attend out-of-district conferences, engage in mentorships, form book study groups, and share resources. Many act as PD representatives in schools, organizing activities and providing assistance. Others sit on various district committees or take part in district PD initiatives.
Bill 11 may provide lots of opportunities for politicians, bureaucrats and enterprising “professional development” companies, but it offers nothing to our already strained educational system. And it offers even less to teachers and trustees who are already engaged in the work of improving teaching and learning in SD46. As for a commitment to consult with teachers on the specific regulations implied in Bill 11, we can all look forward to more wasted time and money while children and families pay the price.
Paddy McCallum, professional development & mentorship chair, Sunshine Coast Teachers Association
