Don’t undermine Ontario’s education advantage
TheStar.com – Opinion/Commentary – Class size and prep time are fundamental to Ontario’s world-class education system. School boards ought not to dismiss them.
Jul 06 2015. By: Denis Mildon and Gilles Fournier
Internationally, Ontario’s education system is considered one of the finest in the world. It did not achieve this accidentally. Through sound research, innovation and policy development Ontario’s system has become a model of equity and inclusiveness in education and, as a result, in student achievement.
Much of this is due to a shift to so-called outcomes-based learning and assessment. In this model, the child is taught as an individual with unique skills and needs and evaluated on the basis of what he or she can demonstrate and the teacher can observe.
These methods, which teachers have been mandated to implement, are effective but time consuming. When classes are too large and teachers denied adequate prep time, the approach is unsustainable.
After a school year during which class size and teacher prep time became central in contract disputes between teachers and school boards, it’s worth reflecting on the large extent to which both are fundamental to the success of Ontario’s world-leading education system.
Individualized learning and outcomes-based assessment impose a large burden on teachers. They must report on the progress of their charges, lesson by lesson, objective by objective, while determining accurately the competency level at which the student is performing for every desired outcome.
In addition teachers are asked to provide immediate feedback to students, parents, and administrative staff. The time required to complete these tasks is imposing but, when properly applied, the approach allows for the best possible method of evaluating students. Consequently the number of pupils teachers must deal with each day has a direct impact on their ability to properly and efficiently assess and report on progress. The larger the class, the less effective the teacher.
Over the last decade, many acquired benefits have been stripped away from teacher contracts (for a variety of reasons that are best left to another discussion) resulting in a slow erosion of the teacher’s time for class preparation. Prep time and professional development days have been deemed a luxury that boards apparently can’t afford. Their relevancy needs to be re-affirmed by all parties.
Sick days and their accumulation have been declared a public shame and an undeserved benefit. The elimination of cumulative sick days has led in most jurisdictions to teachers taking most, if not all of their days, which provides little or no savings to the boards.
Currently, teachers at the secondary level have a fixed number of on-call periods (supervising absent teachers’ classrooms), in some boards up to 28-30 periods per semester. The boards’ position is that the number of these on-call periods could be doubled or more. While the issues at large differ slightly at the elementary level, boards are examining a variety of options to cover absenteeism in-house in order to further reduce costs. However, having regular classroom teachers cover for absenteeism is a poor solution since this can only be accomplished by taking up valuable time normally assigned to complete teachers’ crucial assessment and planning activities.
In fact, teachers are now facing diminishing opportunities during their day to adequately complete all of the tasks required of them. In addition, boards have taken the position that prep time should now be managed by administrative staff with all activities associated with this time defined and allocated at an administrator’s discretion.
There are serious educational consequences to the positions taken by the board and the ministry during the recent round of negotiations. It is vital that all parties examine how to continue the delivery of a curriculum that has proven valid, scientifically sound and highly successful when compared to the western world at large and other provinces in Canada.
Both class size and prep time matter and it is incumbent on the boards and the government to sit down with the unions and accept that these issues must be dealt with in such a way as to ensure that teachers will be able to adequately perform their mandated duties. Boards need to preserve the qualities of equity and inclusion that continue to be a part of Ontario’s remarkable academic achievement.
Dr. Denis Mildon and Gilles Fournier are career classroom teachers and administrators (retired) with further roles as education consultants to many international organizations including the OECD and the World Bank.
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