(Quebec) By giving himself the power to appoint and dismiss the directors general of school service centres, Bernard Drainville is correcting the failures of the previous CAQ reform in education, believes the opposition, which accuses him of attacking his own creature created when the school boards were abolished.
The Press revealed on Wednesday that the Minister of Education will table a bill in Quebec on Thursday in which he will give himself more powers in the management of the school network. In a recent interview, last March, Prime Minister François Legault also deplored that general managers make decisions that do not always please the government, and this, with the agreement of their boards of directors.
These leaders will now be accountable to the minister. Is the government assuming too much power?
“What they are going to do is they are going to ask the directors general to be the spokespersons for the ministry in all circumstances [et] that they only report to the Minister. There are boards of directors that no longer have any real power in the school service centres,” lamented Pascal Bérubé of the Parti Québécois (PQ).
” In other words, [Bernard Drainville] wants to make sure to have total control in all the structures. I think this bill does nothing for the network, except for the minister. […] This is another demonstration of the power that the government of the Coalition avenir Québec wants to arrogate to itself,” he added.
A “massive failure”
For André Fortin of the Quebec Liberal Party (PLQ), this new education reform is proof of a “massive failure” of the government of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) in terms of school governance.
“What they were telling us was [qu’ils donnaient] more power to parents. Today, we see groups of parents fighting in Montreal for services and in Laval because the lunch hour costs are disproportionate. I hope that the next reform, regardless of the version it will have, will give more places to parents, ”he listed.
“If Minister Drainville wants to propose another structural reform to us, it is a clear statement of failure with respect to the one that had been proposed and adopted by Minister Jean-François Roberge,” added Mr. Fortin.
In his reform, Bernard Drainville will also create a national institute of excellence in education. This new organization will represent for the school network what the National Institute of Excellence in Health and Social Services (INESSS) is for health. However, the teachers’ unions have always been opposed to it.
For the parliamentary leader of Québec solidaire (QS), Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, it will above all be necessary to monitor in the bill of the Minister of Education the solutions he brings to the shortage of qualified labor in education.
“There is a lack of teachers and there is a lack of professionals. How do we bring these people back into the education system? If the Drainville reform doesn’t address that, it’s missing the number one problem in education right now,” he said.