An open letter to Education Minister George Abbott.
A few years ago it was explained to the public of B.C. that MLAs deserved a pay raise of 25-49 per cent, depending on their responsibilities, in order to attract and keep the brightest and the best into politics, which, apparently, is very exacting and time-consuming, much more so than either teaching or nursing.
By logical extrapolation, your government is declaring the children of B.C. do not deserve the brightest and the best teachers, nor health-care workers, and that the calling of being a teacher is no more than babysitting angelically behaved children by mediocre adults.
And I see from your media appearances that you are a very reasonable, very courageous, very articulate, well-informed man on educational matters in general, and special-needs education in particular. I, therefore challenge you to put your reasoning, courage, and knowledge where your mouth is. I challenge you to do my job for two weeks, which has entailed working with nearly 400 special-needs children from nearly 80 schools.
You will be completely in charge of the entire program, including identifying the students, creating curriculum, creating/keeping all records, corresponding with hundreds of teachers and parents, providing input on IEPs, arranging all scheduling, reviewing all the latest research, planning and attending professional development, meeting with teachers and parents, buying the necessary resources out of pocket, locating and/or gathering resources for the diversity in 400 children, canvassing the community for handouts…
Given the reason for your two-digit raise being attracting and keeping the brightest and the best, it should be a piece of cake for you to take over my job.
I am sure you have the courage to take on a job that requires little brightness and is for the mediocre.
Pummy Kaur, White Rock
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Editor:
How did a nice lady like Susan Lambert ever get mixed up with the leadership shenanigans of the BCTF?
She is doing herself a great disservice.
It’s been a while since I left school, but it all seems very elementary. By voting down the HST there’s been less money coming in, so less will be going out.
Get used to it.
G. Reid, Surrey
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Re: Big divide over teachers’ strike, March 6 letters.
After reading through the letters to the editor about the teachers’ strike, I’m curious about the amount of time some of the writers have spent in a school recently.
I hope that all who voice opinions about the current dispute have a credible amount of recent personal experience in a classroom upon which to base their arguments.
Donald Fleming, White Rock