“At Risk” Students | Unqualified teachers wanted

The Montreal School Services Center (CSSDM) is looking for teachers who are not legally qualified to teach “at risk” elementary or secondary school students, positions generally reserved for remedial teachers. In schools this year, the number of teachers who do not have a certificate is higher than ever, say the directors.

The job offer published this week is aimed specifically at teachers who do not have a patent: “teacher NOT legally qualified in special education”, reads the title.

” The main role […] consists of supporting the learning of primary school students (approximately 4 to 12 years old) or secondary school students (12 to 21 years old) at risk, with disabilities or with adjustment or learning difficulties (HDAA) in order to promote their personal, academic and social success,” explains the job description.

The number of non-legally qualified teachers in schools has never been so high, observes Nicolas Prévost, president of the Quebec Federation of School Directors (FQDE).

The quality of the people who are recruited in this way diminishes accordingly. “We have some very good ones, but by dint of scratching at the bottom of the barrel, the quality of the people involved decreases a lot. We realize that they are not able to do the work, it creates an incredible turnover for the students,” says Mr. Prévost.

“It’s worse than ever,” says Kathleen Legault, president of the Montreal Association of School Principals (AMDES). “It’s a daily stress to ensure that there is a teacher in each class,” she adds.

Consequently, “it’s not true that we have quality service for our students,” says Nicolas Prévost. Parents are faced with service disruptions.

“We have seen it in certain classes, where the substitutes follow one another. We see teachers who do not stay, they leave after one or two months, ”said Kathleen Legault for her part.

In a press briefing last week, the Minister of Education, Bernard Drainville, noted that “the number of non-legally qualified teachers is increasing sharply”. “Last I think we were around over 4,000,” he said.

At the FQDE, it is estimated that this number is at least 4800.

“On average” 150 vacancies

The president of the Alliance of teachers of Montreal affirms that seeing a job offer “as explicit, it sends the message that the CSSDM is lucid and recognizes that it has a problem recruiting qualified teachers”.

“We had a shock a few years ago with announcements from other service centers asking for a 5^e to do substitute teaching,” recalls Catherine Beauvais St-Pierre.

At the CSSDM, we defend ourselves from looking “specifically for non-legally qualified teachers”.

“We are looking for teachers and we are opening the door to the NLQ… small nuance”, writes its spokesperson, Alain Perron.

In the required skills, for example, candidates are asked to have a bachelor’s degree in psychology and one year of relevant experience with HDAA students.

In this service center alone, there are “on average nearly 150 full-time or part-time teacher assignments to be filled, mainly in special education”.

The school adaptation classes are those where there is the greatest shortage of teachers, confirms the president of the FQDE. “They are our most vulnerable students,” says Nicolas Prévost, who notes that staff turnover “only exacerbates the problems they already have.”

The teachers who usually teach these students are trained in special education at the university.

“I am trained to teach in the ordinary class, if tomorrow morning I am asked to play the remedial teacher, I will manage, but I will certainly not be the best to do this job”, illustrates Catherine Beauvais St-Pierre. “If we’re talking about people who don’t have a bachelor’s degree in education, we’re going even further,” she adds.

Management is anticipating even more difficult years to come in terms of recruitment.

Last week, the Minister of Education, Bernard Drainville, reiterated his desire to tackle the shortage of staff in schools, but at the AMDES, it is said that we “would like to see stronger gestures which are going to have an impact as soon as possible”. We cite for example the payment of internships in education, or even the full reimbursement of university studies.

“For the moment, I am not sure that we realize how urgent what we are experiencing in schools is. It’s problematic and it will affect the success of our students if we don’t react,” says Kathleen Legault.