Open letter to parents offers education workers' views on job action: "Like you, we want services that help children thrive"

Ad blocking detected

Thank you for visiting CanadianInsider.com. We have detected you cannot see ads being served on our site due to blocking. Unfortunately, due to the high cost of data, we cannot serve the requested page without the accompanied ads.

If you have installed ad-blocking software, please disable it (sometimes a complete uninstall is necessary). Private browsing Firefox users should be able to disable tracking protection while visiting our website. Visit Mozilla support for more information. If you do not believe you have any ad-blocking software on your browser, you may want to try another browser, computer or internet service provider. Alternatively, you may consider the following if you want an ad-free experience.

Canadian Insider Ultra Club
$500/ year*
Daily Morning INK newsletter
+3 months archive
Canadian Market INK weekly newsletter
+3 months archive
30 publication downloads per month from the PDF store
Top 20 Gold, Top 30 Energy, Top 40 Stock downloads from the PDF store
All benefits of basic registration
No 3rd party display ads
JOIN THE CLUB

* Price is subject to applicable taxes.

Paid subscriptions and memberships are auto-renewing unless cancelled (easily done via the Account Settings Membership Status page after logging in). Once cancelled, a subscription or membership will terminate at the end of the current term.

Open letter to parents offers education workers' views on job action: "Like you, we want services that help children thrive"

Canada NewsWire

TORONTO, Aug. 22, 2019 /CNW/ - In an open letter to parents and families of Ontario's schoolchildren, the union that represents 55,000 education workers has laid out the reasons that its members are preparing for potential labour disruption in September and asked for families' support and understanding.

Logo: Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) (CNW Group/Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE))

The letter cites students' right to "a high-quality, well-supported, and well-rounded public education" as one of the primary reasons that members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) are taking part in strike votes immediately after students return to class.

The province-wide votes by rank-and-file CUPE members are scheduled to take place between September 3 to 15. A strong "yes" vote would give the union's bargaining team – now in conciliation with the province and the Council of Trustees' Associations (CTA) – a mandate for job action if contract negotiations break down. Earlier this month, CUPE school board leaders approved a plan for job action.

The open letter is signed by Laura Walton, president of CUPE's Ontario School Board Council of Unions (OSBCU), the designated bargaining agent for CUPE education workers. She calls the work of her fellow CUPE members "one of the cornerstones of public education" and states frankly that the union is preparing for job action, ranging from work to rule to rotating strikes to full strike. Walton also paints a picture of students returning to schools that are very different from the ones they left last June.

"Because of the Ford government's cuts to education, it's likely that your child's school has lost education workers," she tells families. "Not enough education assistants to support children with special needs. Not enough custodians to keep schools clean and healthy. Not enough maintenance workers to tackle a backlog of repairs. Not enough school secretaries to monitor who's in the building. Not enough psychologists, child and youth workers, or social workers to nurture vulnerable kids. Not enough music, language or arts instructors to connect students to the world beyond the classroom."

Walton goes on to ask families for their understanding and support: "Yes, we want a better deal for our members – not just because we earn an average $38,000 a year, but because we have children too. And we believe that all families want and support the high-quality services that help children thrive and that CUPE education workers provide."

Collective agreements for school board workers expire on August 31.

SOURCE Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE)

View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/August2019/22/c9065.html

Copyright CNW Group 2019

Comment On!

140
Upload limit is up to 1mb only
To post messages to your Socail Media account, you must first give authorization from the websites. Select the platform you wish to connect your account to CanadianInsider.com (via Easy Blurb).