The Director General of the Sir Wilfrid Laurier School Board, Gaëlle Absolonne, was appointed Tuesday evening to occupy this position at the head of the Center de services scolaire (CSS) Marie-Victorin, at a time when an analysis of the work climate is underway to take stock of the concerns of the organization’s managers.
Following the suspension of Ghislain Plourde from the position of General Manager of CSS Marie-Victorin due to an investigation into potential conflicts of interest concerning him, on November 15, Dominique Lachapelle took over on an interim basis at head of the school service center until an official candidacy for general manager is chosen. Since then, an analysis of the work climate has been entrusted to the firm Arima Conseils, at the request of associations of managers of the school service center, which serves more than 44,000 students on the South Shore of Montreal and has some 5,000 employees. .
The members of the board of directors, however, proceeded Tuesday evening, during a regular meeting, to the appointment of the new general manager of the CSS Marie-Victorin. Ms. Absolonne will thus leave the English-speaking school board of the North Shore of Montreal, which she has been leading since 2018, to take up this position at CSS Marie-Victorin, whose head office is in Longueuil. The exact date of his taking office in this school service center “remains to be determined”, indicated the organization to the DutyTuesday evening.
The board of directors also announced Tuesday evening the upcoming departure of two assistant general managers, France Blouin and Nathalie Ouellet. The reasons for their departure from the organization were not disclosed immediately.
Work atmosphere
Gaëlle Absolonne, who has worked in the education sector since 1996, arrives at the head of the CSS Marie-Victorin when an analysis of the work climate concerning the managers of the organization has been underway since mid-May.
At the heart of the grievances of current and past managers and executives are the management style and governance of the former director general, Marie-Dominique Taillon, now assistant deputy minister at the Ministry of Education, revealed an investigation of Duty Tuesday. In the process, the Liberal Party of Quebec and Quebec solidaire on Tuesday asked for the suspension of Marie-Dominique Taillon, until the conclusions of this analysis of the work climate are known.
In interview at Duty, about fifteen current and former managers and executives have denounced in recent weeks a culture of silence that had taken hold during the passage of Ms. Taillon, then of her spouse, Ghislain Plourde, at the head of this school services center . Mr. Plourde had first succeeded Ms. Taillon as interim director general on March 22, 2022, in anticipation of the departure of his spouse for a position with the Government of Quebec. He resigned on May 9.
During a meeting of the board of directors last month, employees of CSS Marie-Victorin went to the microphone to express the importance of having a transparent process in the appointment of the next general manager of the organization. Ghislain Plourde had obtained this position without there having been an internal or external posting of it. Only his candidacy had been considered then.
The director of the Material Resources Department, Éric Lafrance, had highlighted the importance, according to him, of having a general management acting with “humility” while being attentive to the “diversity of opinions and ideas” from school service center employees.
In anticipation of the appointment of his successor, the board of directors has however made changes “to the mandate entrusted to the selection committee, with a view to better responding to the expectations of the community”, indicated the CSS Marie-Victorin to the Dutyin an email exchange, on June 2.
A posting of the position of general manager was thus made internally and externally. Thus, this time, “several dozen potential candidates from Quebec and outside Quebec” have expressed their interest in occupying this position, said Tuesday evening the chairman of the board of directors of CSS Marie-Victorin, Nicola Grenon. Six candidates were then interviewed, before Gaëlle Absolonne obtained this position following a unanimous recommendation from the Board of Directors. She was unavailable for an interview Tuesday night.
UPAC survey
The new director general of the CSS Marie-Victorin also arrives at the head of the latter at a time when the organization finds itself at the heart of an investigation by the Permanent Anti-Corruption Unit, the reasons for which, however, have not been revealed to us. were explained by the latter.
The duty however, revealed on May 25 that the former superintendent responsible for development and construction in the Material Resources Department of the CSS Marie-Victorin, Alexandre Lobry, was laid off in April after having mobilized blue-collar employees from the organization to work on one of its buildings. This former executive is also one of the partners behind Groupe immobilier Sept inc alongside Éric Lemire, who runs Démolition Probec, which has obtained contracts worth several million dollars as a general contractor from CSS Marie-Victorin in the last years. Ghislain Plourde has also invested in this real estate group in recent years, learned The duty.