Dear Editor:
I write in response to Ron Burton's "Teachers just searching for respect" (Burnaby NOW, Sept. 4).
This letter was intended to be published before any announcement of the possible settlement to the teachers' dispute, which I welcome with great relief. However, the contents of my letter are still to be considered and the points worth making.
With 35 years as a parent, teacher, and Vancouver public school administrator, I would like to share with your readers some of my reaction to Mr. Burton's letter.
I fully support the teachers' quest for equitable wages and better working conditions, but I do not think that it should be at their students' expense.
I am disappointed and surprised that Mr. Burton's submission made only passing reference to that most important element in the teachers' strike: the continued interruption of the education of our students. I would have expected more concern for our students from an incumbent trustee.
The available research evidence is that extended breaks in classroom routine cause disruption to learning with enduring effects on measured student achievement. Studies in particular conducted at the universities of Edinburgh and Rotterdam found that work stoppages adversely affected achievement and even resulted in an increased number of students repeating grades, through no fault of the students themselves. Studies in Ontario have also shown statistically significant correlations between teacher strikes and lower student math scores, with those students "marginalized" academically or socio-economically experiencing the worst of these effects.
While I appreciate that B.C. boards of education and incumbent trustees like Mr. Burton have no power to influence the parties in a dispute, there are ways for incumbent trustees to help local public school children address negative effects of the dispute on later educational achievement.
For example, I would have expected trustee Burton to draw the attention of Burnaby parents to alternatives to in-school public education still open to children even as the strike continued. An example of this is the Ministry of Education's online distributed learning (DL) program - administered through accredited institutions including the Traditional Learning Academy - which are unaffected by BCTF picketing. Homeschooling is also available.
Either option keeps any otherwise vulnerable students learning while public schools are strike-bound - avoiding the disruption with its negative impact on achievement.
I am also concerned that scheduled public meetings of the Burnaby board of education in June and September were cancelled. The board is a body charged with public business. Incumbent trustees cannot simply abandon their responsibilities, including planning for the budgetary consequences of the dispute.
Burnaby parents deserve to know that their trustees do in fact remain on the job, even if they had no meaningful power to settle the dispute.
I am not sure that trustees should flaunt their indifference to the inconveniences that parents also suffer during such an imbroglio between the government and the BCTF. As elected officials they have a responsibility to help its constituents find a resolution to the challenges that school closures create.
I note also that current census data suggest that Burnaby has already lost thousands of its resident children to non-public school options.
Each day a strike occurs, more parents make the decision to find non-public school alternatives with further negative consequences on the public school system.
And schools in other provinces openly advertise in the B.C. media for international students to consider their programs in lieu of B.C. public schools.
Notwithstanding my sympathy for teachers during their struggle to achieve equitable wages and better working conditions, a way had to be found to end the serious disruption and negative consequences that teacher strikes create in the education of our young people.
Yes, "teachers were just searching for respect," but students became innocent victims, who may still experience some negative consequences from the strike.
Ben Seebaran, Burnaby, trustee candidate with Burnaby First Coalition
