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How to Fix Teacher Bargaining? Ideas from Past BCTF Heads
Years of failed negotiations offer government solutions, say former union leaders.
If you need proof that history repeats itself, look no further than the contract negotiations between the provincial government and the B.C. Teachers’ Federation.
Since the New Democratic Party government pushed bargaining from the local to provincial level in 1995, there’s only been one successfully negotiated teacher collective agreement.
During that period legislation has been passed, teachers have walked out, fines have been issued, and classes have been cancelled, and when negotiation time rolls around again both sides profess a desire for change, but change doesn’t happen.
The current case is Bill 22: the Education Improvement Act, which introduces a mediator to the equation, but rules any decision must meet the government’s net-zero mandate, which teachers refuse to accept.
Read The Tyee full article here.
By Katie Hyslop, 26March2012, TheTyee.ca
Teachers warn of new job action including full shutdown: ‘Our members are angry,’ BCTF president says
The B.C. Teachers’ Federation has warned the Liberal government to radically change its approach to public education or face more protests by teachers, including the possibility of a provincewide shutdown of public schools.
“Our members are angry,” union president Susan Lambert told a news conference a day after she was re-elected to head the organization for another year.
She said delegates who attended the BCTF’s annual general meeting this week drafted a “bold plan of action” that will be presented to 41,000 teachers for a vote April 17-18.
While not divulging full details of the plan, Lambert said it includes asking members if they want to withdraw from all extracurricular activities – as teachers have already done in some school districts – and whether they want to walk a picket line in an illegal strike. She suggested a second vote would be called before such action would be authorized.
Read THE VANCOUVER SUN full article here.
jsteffenhagen@vancouversun.com
Blog: vancouversun.com/reportcard
How My Teaching Has Changed
It is easy to talk about what could be, what should be and what other people could do. Instead, I would like to share what I have done, and what we are trying to do, as we engage in and embrace this learning evolution.
I began my career trying to emulate the teachers I remembered most, and through the stories I remembered from my school experiences. The teacher was mixing content, stories and weaving a narrative. While hardly an actor, there was something about the performance of teaching I really did enjoy. I would organize the desks in a circle, and while this was great for students to engage with each other, it also gave me centre stage. I was very focussed on the lesson plan and activities in the classroom. I saw myself as the expert, and it was up to me and the textbook to help students understand the content. Now, here is a true confession — I loved being the ‘sage on the stage’. In my Social Studies and English classes I would often retell the stories my memorable teachers had told me.
As I became more comfortable, I tried to allow students more of an opportunity to tell their stories. I worked to create situations where students could simulate the real world. In History class this might have been a United Nations role-play lesson, or reviewing a series of case studies in Law class. Students loved the examples drawn from the “real world”. In Law, we would study cases making headlines in the news, and other Social Studies’ classes leant themselves ideally to current events. I loved the relevance that came from these lessons, as well as the engagement. Combining my lectures with hands-on activities, like putting Louis Riel on trial, led to an even richer teaching and learning experience.
Read Chris Kennedy’s article here.
By Chris Kennedy, February 22, 2012 The cultureofyes Blog
Hunger Games fans switch arenas from page to screen
What is it about The Hunger Games that has made it the hottest teen fiction series since Harry Potter and Twilight? We went to the source and found three avid and articulate fans — ages 17 to 74 — to tell us. They love Suzanne Collins’ best-selling dystopian trilogy about a future dictatorship in which teens, primped by stylists and costume designers, are forced to fight to the death on TV. And they’re just as excited about the highly anticipated movie version of the first book, starring Jennifer Lawrence as heroine Katniss Everdeen. It opens Friday.
Read more in THE VANCOUVER SUN here.
BY BOB MINZESHEIMER, MCT MARCH 19, 2012
Susan Lambert wins election, stays BCTF president
The BC Teachers’ Federation executive committee elections this morning saw incumbent President Susan Lambert keep her position, beating out challenger Rick Guenther by 429 votes to 238.
Lambert, a teacher librarian who began her teaching career in Prince Rupert in the early 1970s, has been president of the teachers’ union since 2010. Lambert ran as a part of “The Coalition,” a slate that includes 1st Vice President Jim Iker, who also retained his seat, and 2nd Vice President Glen Hansman, whose seat is being challenged by Stephen Zlotnik, a teacher from Boundary.
Challenger Rick Guenther, an independent member of the BCTF executive, had hoped to unseat Lambert telling The Vancouver Sun the Coalition had been in power for 10 years and it was time for a change. Guenther campaigned on the platform that the BCTF wasn’t engaging with the government or teacher-associated groups like the BC Coalition of Parent Advisory Councils, and that the teachers’ public image was in need of repair.
Teachers’ rejected that position, however, in favour of Lambert who has received strong support from both teachers and fellow public sector unions like the BC Federation of Labour, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, and several national and international teachers’ unions, during the BCTF’s fight against the Education Improvement Act, which legislates teachers to return to the bargaining table with their employers, and a government approved mediator, to reach a net zero contract agreement by the end of June.
Teachers are supposed to decide today or tomorrow the next steps in their fight against the legislation, which could include everything from withdrawing from extracurricular activities to a full-scale illegal walkout that could cost the union up to $20 million a day in fines.
By Katie Hyslop March 20, 2012 10:42 am – The Tyee Hook Blog
Katie Hyslop reports on education and youth issues for The Tyee and The Tyee Solutions Society.