Some Information and News

Hi Folks,

Hope everyone was able to get a bit of a rest over spring break.

Living With Balance

This is an excellent program designed specifically for teachers, by teachers. It is at no cost to any participant. It is being offered in our district in three sessions on May 4th, 25th, and June 1st. The program is somewhat self-descriptive. It has received very positive reviews from teachers in other districts that have taken the program. For more information and registration please go to the following link:

http://www.bctf.ca/LivingWithBalance.aspx

AGM

Richard, Shawn and I attended the BCTF Annual General Meeting from March 16th – 19th. 800 teachers from around the province attended and debated issues, set next year’s fee and elected next year’s executive committee.

Next year’s Executive Committee will be the following:

Table Officers:

President – Jim Iker – Burns Lake
1st Vice President – Glen Hansman – Vancouver Elementary
2nd Vice President – Teri Mooring – Quesnel

Members at Large: elected this year

Gail Chaddock-Costello – Langley
Janine Fraser – Boundary
Teresa Gradinetti – Coquitlam
David Komljenovic – Kamloops
Paul Steer – Delta

Members at Large: continuing until next year

Joanna Larson – Prince Rupert
Mike Ball – Nanaimo
Susan Lambert – Past President – Burnaby

The fee was set at the same rate as this year at 1.69%. The SIP fee was set at 1.57%. (We currently receive an allowance of 2% for SIP)

Provincial Bargaining

The Framework Agreement reached with BCPSEA agrees that each party will report to their members on protected sites. You can see the recent provincial bargaining report at the following link:

https://bctf.ca/myBCTF/ReportFromTheTable/

It is a part of the members only portal of the BCTF website.

The BCPSEA objectives are outlined in Report # 4. You may recognize them.

Local Bargaining

We have set our local objectives and bargaining team and we were about to begin local negotiations with our Board on April 4th. This date has been postponed until the Board has consulted with BCPSEA with respect to their local bargaining plan. It is not clear what this means. We will keep everyone posted when we have some meeting dates.

Staffing

The Board initially indicated they want to cut approximately 7.0 FTE from district teaching staff. We have heard no change from the last update. We should receive official word on April 4th.

VINTA AGM

Our local AGM is scheduled for Wednesday April 24th at 4:30 at the Sunset gym. We will elect our Executive Committee at this meeting. We will also set our local fee for the 2013-14 year. Everyone currently pays a flat rate of $600. There was a motion at last year’s AGM that VINTA research moving to a percentage-based fee. The Executive looked at this and there will be a motion at this year’ AGM from the Executive to move to a percentage-based fee. The suggested fee is .7%. This would result in a very slight savings to folks at the top end of the scale and a progressively larger saving as you go down the pay scale. It will also mean less money collected in VINTA dues during the year. Please attend our AGM and take part in this discussion and debate.

Finland

This is an interesting article in The Tyee about a book outlining the evolution of Finnish public education.

http://thetyee.ca/Books/2013/03/26/Finnish-Schools/

Fred Robertson
President
Vancouver Island North Teachers’ Association
lp85@bctf.ca