Door open for accountability framework in legislation or future contract: Cockrill

As Saskatchewan’s teachers start an indefinite term of “work to rule,” the province’s education minister appears to be opening up more avenues to try to get the teachers’ committee to the bargaining table.

On Monday, Education Minister Jeremy Cockrill said he’s offered to put the Memorandum of Understanding that was recently offered to the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation (STF) into legislation.

“When you put something in the Education Act, that becomes law. I think that was our effort to show that we’re serious about the accountability framework, school divisions are serious about the accountability framework and that was an option that we wanted to put out there,” said Cockrill.

The MOU would require that school divisions have an accountability framework in place to give local teachers a voice in how government funds are spent, though it doesn’t prescribe what those frameworks would have to look like.

Before the Easter long weekend, STF president Samantha Becotte was cautiously optimistic about the idea of the MOU, but since the STF has simply said it’s waiting for clarification on the language included.

On Monday, Cockrill said the language in any legislation would be fairly general and there’s an understanding with school divisions that accountability is important.

“What we would envision for the legislation is having the requirement, and then obviously reviewing what school divisions put forward in the future and making sure that it lives up to that,” explained Cockrill.

The minister thinks the offer of legislation is a good step to making the accountability legally binding, but he seemed to leave the door open to other conversations as well.

“Even down the road, I’m not necessarily closed off to the idea of the accountability framework being in a contract, potentially,” said Cockrill.

He said that’s a discussion he’s willing to have with school divisions and the STF leadership going forward.

“When I think about the conversations that I’ve had with teachers (and) with school divisions, there’s an understanding that we need to have better accountability and more transparent accountability in the sector,” he said.

Cockrill said he wouldn’t be open to the multi-year funding agreement made with school divisions being in the contract, as had been suggested by the STF in the past.

It doesn’t appear the STF is interested in the cookie Cockrill is offering in the form of legislation. Becotte said it wouldn’t fix the issues the STF has with the promises not being binding.

“I know legislation would seem to be more binding. There’s definitely more hoops to go through in order to change it, but the government would still be able to make changes to it unilaterally, at least not with the input of the federation or the (Saskatchewan School Boards Association),” explained Becotte.

She said the contract is the best place for accountability.

Cockrill suggesting the framework be included in the contract could be a possibility to give Becotte a bit of hope. She said that though the statement was vague, it is different from positions she’s heard in the past.

“We want to engage in that back and forth,” she said. “We want to come to an agreement that works for government but also provides teachers with those assurances that conditions in our classrooms are going to improve and we’re going to have more support in order to make sure that we can deliver that high-quality education that every child deserves.”

The sides have been going back and forth the past couple of weeks about the accountability process. Becotte said the STF had been trying to include language around dispute resolution and making the guarantees more binding, but the government rejected its suggestion.

Regardless, Becotte said that’s not the end of talks as the STF still wants to work toward a solution. She thinks they are close.

“I do think that there’s a solution that is hopefully in our near future. We’re definitely willing to find that solution,” she said.

The Saskatchewan NDP agrees with the STF when it comes to whether legislation would plug the holes of their concerns.

“I’m not sure that would satisfy the level of accountability that, frankly, we need to hold this minister and this Sask. Party government to to provide for the supports our classrooms need,” said Matt Love, the NDP’s education critic.

Love pointed to legislation that lays out timing for elections, saying it’s still up to government whether it follows through on that.

Work to rule

In the meantime, teachers in Saskatchewan schools aren’t putting in time outside of class hours, including working on extracurriculars or graduation planning.

Cockrill has said previously his government will guarantee that high school graduation ceremonies will go ahead as normally as possible, though on Monday he couldn’t say exactly what that would mean.

“We’ve put a call out, ‘Tell us what you need and government wants to be there to support that and make sure that graduations go ahead as normal as possible,’ ” said Cockrill.