A few comments about not being sure what teachers want. I actually like the ATA's strategy of bargaining at the table and not in the media - it takes a lot of power away from the other side to criticize it or activate public support against it.
Anyway, here is what I'd like.
- 15% immediate salary increase with 3% a year thereafter (the nurse deal).
- stricter limits on instructional and assignable time (forcing the schools to hire more teachers) so that I have time within the regular work day to do the non-instructional parts of my job.
- more support in the forms of guaranteed funding for high needs students. For example a school I know of has more than 240 ESL students (50% of the population) and almost 100 students with IPPs and no dedicated ESL teacher, ESL assistant, or resource teacher. All of the associated preparation, instruction, and paperwork for every one of those students is left to the classroom teacher.
- phased in soft class size caps with teacher compensation for additional workload near the end of the deal. Penalties should increase as time goes on for not meeting the cap.
Honestly just partially addressing some of the things above would get me to vote yes. But the government refuses to even talk about any of these things. They are standing firm on 3% a year for four years and hiring 3000 teachers (there are 2000 public schools in Alberta). Where are these teachers even coming from? No one is banging down the door to teach in this province.
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