Students will see their activities outside of school cancelled, modified or curtailed due to the lack of school bus drivers and more restricted schedules to transport them. This situation could jeopardize the participation of young people in the two cultural outings per year financed by Quebec, believe actors in the field.
At the Center de services scolaire de la Capitale, in Quebec City, which has 68 establishments and 31,000 students, carriers have indicated that they will provide transportation for outings only between 9:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. react several teachers, explains to the To have to Valérie Drapeau, interim president of the Syndicat de l’enseignement de la region de Québec (SERQ).
“There are activities that will not be done, or that will be cut short,” she says. It brings a lot of logistical problems, and there will be choices to be made. »
She specifies that this situation first affects schools further from the center of the city, for which access to cultural places, such as theatres, and to points of attraction will be “virtually made impossible”. Due to time constraints, some may, for example, shorten a hike to the Cap-Tourmente National Wildlife Area. Or judge that an outing will be too expensive for the time that the activity can last, because of the travel time which will greatly reduce the time available.
“Outputs that were run in over the years will no longer be able to work with these parameters, underlines Valérie Drapeau. It will penalize students who have already lost opportunities [de sortie] because of COVID-19. “After two years of COVID making it impossible to access certain places, now it’s school transportation. It’s very unfortunate,” she adds.
Restricted schedules will also require additional logistical effort for teachers. “There will be more planning to do. We will have to organize things to do with the students before leaving for the activity, and also after the outing, ”underlines Valérie Drapeau.
“We have to adapt”
Invited to comment on the situation, the Center de services scolaire de la Capitale believes, for its part, that this restricted schedule “does not prevent educational outings”. “But we have to adapt, because time is limited,” admits communications advisor Marie-Claude Lavoie.
Alternative solutions will be needed, adds Carl Ouellet, president of the Association québécoise du personnel de direction des écoles. “We are really looking for solutions right now, and we will find them,” he says.
“Perhaps there are organizations that can move rather than the students moving. Things can be done, if possible, through the Web. We are looking at all possible solutions,” he said.
However, the activities at school are not of the same magnitude as those outside, underlines the SERQ. “Some will fall back on bringing plays or artists to school,” says Valérie Drapeau. But these are not the same budget envelopes. »
Quebec announced that two free cultural outings per year would be funded from the start of the 2019 school year, with investments of $112.5 million over five years. Are these activities now in jeopardy?
“That could be the case in the medium term if we don’t find solutions, thinks Carl Ouellet. But we called on the Ministry of Education to help us in negotiations with carriers. The Federation of Bus Carriers (FTA) did not respond to the requests of the To have to.
It will be more complex to achieve this objective, recognizes Valérie Drapeau. “In this context, it will be difficult. Not everywhere, but in some circles it will be complicated,” she says.
According to her, the sums for school outings in cultural settings are very likely not to be used entirely. She adds that the amounts that were not spent could be repatriated by the government last year.
The Ministry of Education indicates, for its part, that it is “sensitive to the problem of the shortage of bus drivers” and adds that it “will continue to support school service centers in the management” of this file, while recalling that the responsibility for organizing school transportation for students rests with educational institutions.
“An additional $11 million was allocated in the last budget under the financial assistance program for the retention of school bus drivers, which increased the budget for this measure to $35.1 million while by introducing a new attraction bonus. In concrete terms, this represents more than 13,000 bus and sedan drivers who will be able to take advantage of the measure in 2022-2023,” the ministry explained in an email sent to the To have to.