The Quebec government’s decision to invest $540 million in education one month after asking school service centres to reduce their expenses by $570 million is being seen as a partial backtrack on the part of the education minister.
And while it’s being welcomed as “good news” by school leaders, some say the damage to the network is already done.
“It’s a good effort. But of course, it’s not enough and it’s not more money injected, right? It’s countering the cuts that he announced in June,” said Steven Le Sueur, the president of the Quebec Provincial Association of Teachers (QPAT).
“He’s backtracking on part of it,” added Anne Dionne, the second vice-president of Centrale des syndicats du Québec. “So there’s still $30 million missing. And the damage has, unfortunately, most probably been already done on some of the workers that have gone elsewhere.”
Wednesday’s funding announcement by Quebec Education Minister Bernard Drainville came following weeks of mounting pressure and a petition against budget cuts directly affecting student services that was launched by the Parti Québécois on the National Assembly website. That petition has more than 158,000 signatures.
On annonce une enveloppe pouvant atteindre 540 millions de dollars pour les services aux élèves.On choisit l’éducation, on choisit nos élèves, sans sacrifier la bonne gestion.Déclaration ???????? pic.twitter.com/AAeECpvCJi
“We mobilized,” said Katherine Korakakis, president English Parents’ Committee Association of Quebec. “I don’t know if you looked at the last numbers of the petition, but parents mobilized, the educational community mobilized. And I think there’s power in not sitting quiet.”
“The mobilization of everybody, union, but not just the union,” added François Enault, the first vice-president of the Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN). “You see the people, the parents, the kids, all that mobilization in a couples weeks.”
The timing of the $540 million in funding is being criticized because of concerns that certain student service workers won’t be returning to schools.
“It could be like speech therapists. It could be technicians. It could be learning aids,” Korakakis said. “It’s all the people around the child that make learning possible. So when you have a child in the classroom that has special needs and they don’t have somebody helping them, it impacts the entire class because now the teacher’s focus is focused on a few students as opposed to the entire class.
“Staff has been let go,” Korakakis continued. “They weren’t going to come back. These people have found jobs, right? They’re not waiting for somebody to say, ‘hey, come back.’ So now we’re left with who’s going to come in and take these roles.”
Added Dionne: “That’s one thing that we’re afraid of is that we most probably have lost a lot of people that most probably won’t come back. And as it was, it was complicated to get people in those lines of work.”
“In Quebec right now, we need some staff everywhere,” said Enault. “So if you’re not sure you will have a job in September, what you will do? You will find a job in another place. And that’s what our people is doing.”
Going forward, Quebec’s education minister has stated that for school service centres to qualify for the funding announced, they will have to demonstrate they have made efforts to reduce their administrative expenses and that the money will be used exclusively for student services.
“We haven’t heard all the details from the government, how this is all going to work,” Le Sueur said. “A little bit came out saying they’re going to have to do a report so that they can get the money. So what are you going to work and maybe get the money at the end? Who knows? We’ll have to see when it all pans out in September.”
