It is not a real catch-up plan that Minister Bernard Drainville tabled yesterday. The plan aims at best to save the furniture. Above all, it is an admission that, for a few thousand children who experienced the five-week FAE strike, it is not possible to recover.
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Through his explanations, we understood that the minister does not even have the power to impose a real recovery of lost days. To affect spring break, extend the school year or extend class hours, the government would have to obtain approval from the unions.
Do you think he has the inclination to undertake a new negotiation? In Quebec, the unions are leading, the ministers are struggling.
No day taken back
It’s a collective shame. Children in FAE schools have missed five weeks of class and not a single day will be resumed. At the beginning of March, we will go on spring break. The height of ridicule, we don’t even skip the educational days!
The minister therefore does not have the power to offer the services to which children should be entitled: 180 days of school, giving them a chance of success. In fact, the minister has two powers: to reduce requirements and to spend money.
This explains the plan presented on Tuesday. We are reducing the exam requirements, so we are cutting a little from the program. In short, we are making a compromise in the quality of education offered to children. We did this during a pandemic, judging that it was a case of force majeure. There, we do it again for a work conflict. Imagine the cumulative effect for the many children who will have experienced both.
A lot of money
The minister’s greatest power: putting money on the table. He’s going full steam ahead: 300 million. It will be up to local authorities to use the funds to offer lifelines to students who are falling furthest behind. The offer may be very unequal from one region to another, but the financial effort is colossal.
The plan represents a laudable effort by a minister with limited powers to limit the damage. One fact remains: this is a wasted school year for many children.
They are the victims of the strike. Some will pay a price for years. Twenty-four days missed out of a school calendar which provides for 180, that represents more than 13%. And here, I ignore the fact that after an absence of seven weeks, this week must be used for revision, a bit like after the summer vacation.
The FAE will maintain that this strike was necessary to save public education in Quebec. I reserve my judgment, waiting to see the extent of the real improvements. But even in this optimistic scenario, we will have to remember these children who will pay the price of a union strategy for a long time.
Once the dust has settled, I hope that someone will have the courage to open the debate for the future: should we define the right to strike in the school world? The right to strike is sacred. The right to education has been violated.