Quebec is releasing even more millions of dollars to requalify or recruit no less than 25,000 early childhood educators by 2026.
The Ministers of Family, Mathieu Lacombe, and Labor, Jean Boulet, hope to recruit 18,000 new ones, through various incentives, and requalify 7,000 who may, for example, be presently in the network without having the full required qualification.
With the funds already announced last April for the first cohort of students who have begun training, a total of $295 million will be allocated to various measures. Some 550 people have already started this work-study program.
A whole range of measures are offered: work-study work-study training which is paid for five days, possible recognition of prior learning, scholarships per study session and bonuses for retirees who return to work.
The latter will be offered a bonus of 6.6% which could represent $3,000, specified Minister Boulet.
Also, an unemployed person will be able to receive $475 per week to begin their training course.
In the case of a student who follows his three-year college training in Childhood Education Techniques, he will be able to receive a scholarship of $1,500 per successful full-time session, i.e. a total of $9,000 for the three years. .
We have to send you reinforcements, the educators, and we also have to prepare the next generation.
“I know that it’s not easy with COVID-19 in educational childcare right now. Everyone has their hands full. In our daycare services, we have a lot of work. We promised, in addition to that, to offer a place to each toddler. We must send reinforcements to you, the educators, and we must also prepare the next generation,” summed up Minister Lacombe.
A more comprehensive plan
This vast offensive to recruit educators in daycare services is part of Quebec City’s plan to open 37,000 places there. Moreover, when he announced this plan, it was the question that was on everyone’s lips: how to open so many places when there is already a shortage of educators?
The agreement for the renewal of the collective agreements with all the union organizations that represent workers in daycare services will certainly contribute to revaluing this profession, underlined Minister Lacombe.
Quebec also launched an advertising campaign to attract interested parties.
Well received from the unions
The two main labor organizations that represent these workers have received the announced measures, while issuing warnings about the desire to accelerate the training of educators at all costs.
“This should not be done by compromising on the quality of the training offered. Indeed, we insist on the importance of offering the most complete training possible, and, for us, the benchmark should be the Diploma of Collegial Studies,” said the vice-president of the Centrale des unions du Québec. , Line Camerlain.
The central union is also asking to quickly return to the ratio of two workers out of three trained within a CPE. This ratio was temporarily lowered to one worker in three, due to staff shortages.
The same applies to the Confederation of National Trade Unions (CSN), which also asserts that the improvement of working conditions in CPEs, during the last negotiation of collective agreements, is “the best calling card for convincing people to come and work in the educational childcare services network,” said the vice-president of the Federation of Health and Social Services, affiliated with the CSN, Lucie Longchamps.