Lack of lunch-hour supervision by Sask. teachers leaving some parents frustrated

The latest move by teachers to stop providing lunch-hour supervision until the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation and the province can get back to the bargaining table isn’t only affecting kids, but parents as well.

It might not seem like a big deal for parents who have older kids as most can look after themselves, but for parents who have kids in elementary school, the lack of noon-hour supervision is throwing a wrench into their day.

“What is happening has been troublesome for the parents,” said Bikash Buri, who has a daughter at École River Heights School in Saskatoon.

“We have to leave work. I have to take a 15-minute break and come here. We have to have our lunch and then again, I have to drop her back and go back to work.”

Amir Akhter has one child in Grade 8 at École River Heights School and another in high school. Akhter and his wife are having to change the look of their day because of the teachers’ withdrawal of lunch-hour supervision.

“We have to reschedule our working schedule. It’s a big trouble for us,” Akhter said.

To make matters tougher for Akhter and his family, they have no choice but to pick up their daughter from high school as she has special needs and can’t afford to be left alone.

“It’s a terrible experience to pick (my son) up in the lunchtime. We have another child in high school and we’re going there to pick her up as well,” Akhter explained. “She’s a special child and we have no other option but to pick them up and send them back to school.”

Krista Stewart was in charge of watching not just her kids but her friend’s kids on Tuesday as they ate their lunch in the field across from the school.

She was a little luckier than most as she didn’t have to work on Tuesday, but she suggested it hasn’t been easy.

“It’s definitely stressful just trying to rearrange your schedule and make sure you’re here for your kids,” she said. “We’ve been lucky with friends.

“We’ve been able to arrange a lot of group efforts (with) parents (taking turns) hanging out with all the kids together. If we didn’t, it would be really difficult.”

Stewart doesn’t work fulltime, so she can be more flexible than other parents. She admits that has been a big help.

“I don’t work every day, so I’m able to come sometimes,” she said. “But on the days I work, it would be really hard.”

Stewart calls the whole situation between the province and teachers frustrating.

“I really would love for them to reach an agreement. I think for the kids, it’s really frustrating to kind of have all these disruptions and all these things cancelled,” she said. “The extracurriculars don’t really affect us at this age for my kids, but I think it’s been really hard for everyone.

“I’m hoping they really come to an agreement soon.”

The teachers have been without a contract since August. The STF declared an impasse in negotiations in October and started implementing sanctions in January.

Those have included rotating strikes, the withdrawal of lunch-hour supervision and the withholding of extracurricular supervision. That caused the cancellation of the Hoopla provincial high school basketball championships; the tournament was reduced to a one-day affair.

One of the main sticking points in the dispute is classroom complexity, and the provincial government has proposed a Memorandum of Understanding to address that issue. The teachers’ union has asked for clarification on the language in the MOU.

On Monday, Education Minister Jeremy Cockrill and STF president Samantha Becotte spoke about the possibility of including the accountability framework in legislation or perhaps in the contract.

In the meantime, the STF’s work-to-rule campaign is in place indefinitely and it appears changes won’t be coming until the province and teachers return to the bargaining table.