As many as 40 new teaching jobs could open up in the Burnaby school district in the next few days after the provincial government announced $50 million in new money this week to hire about 1,100 teachers provincewide.
The announcement is being described as a first step in responding to a November Supreme Court of Canada ruling that sided with the B.C. Teachers’ Federation (BCTF) in a battle over contract language related to the size and composition of classes.
Local school district officials will meet with the Burnaby Teachers’ Association (BTA) next week to sort out the details, according to local teacher union president Frank Bonvino.
“It’s kind of a big scramble to get this out as quickly as possible,” he told the NOW.
Schools already submit requests for extra staffing every spring, vying for money from the district’s Education Fund allocation, according to Bonvino, and he said those requests could now help guide the union and school district in determining where extra teaching positions are needed.
“A small fraction of those requests were met,” he said, “but a lot of them weren’t because there’s not enough money in the system, but it identifies schools’ needs, so that would be a document that would have some value for us as a starting point for conversations.”
Bonvino would also like the schools consulted to see if any new staffing needs have arisen since the spring.
“We’re still working on the process in terms of how all of this is going to work, but that’s a way to go, to look at Ed Fund requests.”
One way or another, Bonvino said it will be important for the district to get the hiring process going as quickly as possible since it will be competing with districts across the province for teachers.
“You’re trying to attract the best people as quickly as possible,” he said. “It’s going to be very intense.”
District secretary-treasurer Russell Horswill directed the NOW’s request for comment to school board chair Ron Burton.
“It’s an exciting time for education,” Burton said. “We’re actually adding and making the system better.”
The board chair was short on details about the process moving forward, but he said the district was looking at adding more teacher support in classrooms for the rest of the school year rather than reconfiguring classes to make them smaller.
“It’s more to complement the classroom,” he said. “It’s not making class sizes smaller. They don’t want to disrupt classes in the middle of term.”
