OSSTF Questions the Decision to Move March Break to April
The head of the union representing high school teachers in Windsor-Essex is questioning the decision to move March Break.
President of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation District 9, Erin Roy, says the government didn't contact unions or the school boards before making the decision.
She says there are consequences to the change.
"On the secondary side we plan everything around what the calendar was. So now we may have to adjust when the quadmester exams are. We may have to adjust when the quadmester ends and when we begin. And we also have in the back of our minds 'what if they just move it again'," Roy says.
Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce announced Thursday that March Break will be moved to April 12 in an effort to reduce community transmission of COVID-19.
Lecce said he made the decision based on the advice of public health officials, calling it critical to avoid a repeat of youth-related COVID-19 cases that occurred over the winter break.
Lecce said health experts are predicting a third wave of the infection in mid-March due to new variants of the virus.
He told AM800's The Afternoon News that the move is designed to discourage travel and gatherings to prevent that third wave.
"If we continue to follow measures we could avoid that wave, quite frankly, by taking action into our own hands and not compromising the progress we've made across Windsor-Essex and across the province," he says. "We've seen numbers coming down and staying down."
Roy agrees it's more about controlling behaviour.
"I do think what the government is doing is they're basically making education try to control the behaviour of communities," she says. "They do know when parents are off with kids and there may be some gatherings, they're trying to fix a health problem on the backs of education."
A physically distanced classroom with masks and hand sanitizer is seen at Kensington Community School amidst the COVID-19 pandemic on Tuesday, September 1, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Carlos Osorio
Four teachers' unions, including the OSSTF, issued a statement yesterday saying mental health wasn't considered in the move.
The union for education workers criticized the government's claim that the delay is aimed at stemming COVID-19 infections, arguing proper safety measures haven't been taken in schools.
Roy says there's talk of new measures for safety in schools but not much has been seen locally.
"The asymptomatic testing, we haven't seen that play out. The increased measures haven't seen that play out," she says. "So what he says and what's actually happening on the ground, I do feel that he's somewhat tone-deaf to what's happening on the ground in our schools."
New COVID-19 projections issued yesterday say an "aggressive" vaccination schedule and a stay-at-home order will help prevent another surge in cases.
The scientists say public health measures have cut COVID-19 case counts, hospitalizations and positivity rates across the province.
But they say new COVID-19 variants are concerning and cases will likely grow again in late February, which will lead to more admissions to intensive care units.
With files from Gord Bacon and the Canadian Press