The shortage of workers in private schools in Quebec, although difficult to quantify, is very real and is of concern to union representatives who partly associate it with the “violence” suffered by teachers in particular from intransigent parents.
“The current labour shortage is worrisome,” said Stéphane Lapointe, president of the Fédération du personnel de l’enseignement privé (FPEP-CSQ), on Thursday. At a press conference in downtown Montreal, he stressed the importance of “countering violence in all its forms in educational institutions” in order to make “the school climate more positive,” and therefore more attractive to staff.
“Let’s all work in the same direction to create attraction towards education professions by ensuring that respect and kindness are strong values in our educational establishments,” he pleaded.
Currently, it is difficult to have a clear picture of the shortage of manpower in private schools, since the Ministry of Education’s dashboard does not quantify it as it does for the public school system, where 2,707 teaching positions were reported to be filled as of Wednesday.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have any figures from our unions,” said Mr. Lapointe. One thing is certain, the lack of staff forces private schools, as is the case in the public network, to resort in part to a workforce that is not legally qualified, which increases the workload of those who must train them in the field, stressed the vice-president of the FPEP-CSQ, Marie-Josée Dallaire, on Thursday.
Joined by The Dutythe Federation of Private Educational Institutions stressed that its members are autonomous in managing the hiring of their staff. They therefore do not have data for all of their members. However, the latter generally use the federation’s website to post their job offers. There were 89 as of Thursday, including 37 for teaching positions.
A call for “civility”
In order to make private schools more attractive to their employees, measures must be taken to “put an end to psychological violence and verbal violence, which are the types of violence most experienced by the staff we represent,” stressed Stéphane Lapointe. He notably mentioned the many aggressive emails that school staff members receive from dissatisfied parents.
“Excessive demands from parents, lack of respect in communications with school team members” are “significant obstacles to motivation for our members,” argued Mr. Lapointe. He thus advocates for a “stricter” application of the student code of conduct and the adoption of “civility policies” in communications between parents and school staff so that they are more “benevolent.”
“It’s a team effort to be done with parents, who must trust the skills of the school team, who must support the interventions that are made at school and who must create a climate that is conducive to learning at home, which is then reflected at school,” she also stressed.me Dallaire: “It takes collective work where parents and schools work hand in hand.”