By Jeff Labine

Teachers’ association remains optimistic about changes

Jan 17, 2017 | 4:00 PM

With the possibility of amalgamation and cutbacks looming, the president of the Prince Albert and Area Teachers’ Association is remaining optimistic that any changes shouldn’t negatively impact students.

Daniel Poirer, whose association represents roughly 850 teachers across two school boards, has been following the latest developments after the provincial sent out letters to public sector workers asking them to freeze or rollback wages otherwise there could be potential cuts.

Adding to this is the uncertainty on how the government will react to a recent report that looked at improving the education system. According to the report called Educational Governance Review the province has 28 boards — 18 public, nine separate and one francophone — with more than 176,300 students. The report included the options of bringing all public boards under one roof or changing the current school division boundaries.

A decision has yet to be made.

Poirer said no matter what happens, the end result must help the students.

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“With all these uncertainties, we aren’t sure what these changes are going to be and what the final financial constraints will come to be,” he said.

“Our hope is that it shouldn’t have a direct effect on students in the classroom. All these changes could be good. If there’s any cutbacks, it affects the students because we are already trying to meet a wide variety of our student’s needs, abilities and backgrounds and so forth. We always need more to deal with all these issues.”

Poirer suggested the government should consult more with teachers when making major decisions as they are the ones directly involved with the community and students. He argued that schools act as the central hub for communities, which provides support for not only the student but for families as well.

Poirer said it can be difficult to keep teachers and other education professionals when there are cutbacks and added it is common for teachers just starting out to switch careers within the first five years because of the demands they have to face.

“It is a difficult profession,” he said. “It is a rewarding profession but there’s all these changes. We aren’t adverse to changes but trying to meet all the needs of our students in the classroom can be difficult at times. We always try our best. We have the skills, we have the knowledge and we have the judgment to help achieve these gaps between students. But with a wide variety of needs in the classroom, it puts pressures on the teachers. There’s more things put on the plates of teachers.”

Jeff Labine is paNOW’s health and education reporter. He can be reached at Jeff.Labine@jpbg.ca or tweet him @labinereporter..