After-school activities could return to public elementary schools
Posted January 16, 2013 7:45 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Extracurricular activities could return to Ontario’s public elementary schools as teachers will soon decide whether to continue their boycott.
Members of the Elementary Teachers of Toronto (ETT) told CityNews that the provincial union will meet before March 1 to discuss an end to the boycott.
Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO) president Sam Hammond later said a decision will also depend on the outcome of the upcoming Liberal leadership convention.
Hammond urged teachers to abstain from volunteering until a decision is reached.
The ETT and Toronto members of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation (OSSTF) held a demonstration on Tuesday to protest last week’s scrubbed planned job action.
They demonstrated at Mowat Block, at Bay and Wellesley streets, to protest last week’s decision by the Ontario Labour Relations Board, which they called “frustrating.”
The OSSTF was supposed to hold their day of protest on Wednesday but cancelled the demonstration after the elementary protest was cancelled.
The union said in a release that members from 14 boards would hold protests at their local MPP offices on Wednesday.
The protests were announced after Education Minister Laurel Broten imposed contracts on teachers using Bill 115 on Jan. 3.
The unions claim Bill 115 violated their rights to collective bargaining and have filed court challenges.
The imposed contract included a wage freeze, 10 sick days — down from 20 — and grandfathering out the practice of banking unused sick days. It was based on an agreement with the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association (OECTA) and Ontario’s French teachers.
The province reached tentative agreements with two education unions — the Canadian Union of Public Employees and the Ontario Public Service Employees Union — and reached deals with 65 of 270 school boards.
The government-imposed contract expires in August 2014.