By Rob Faulkner
The Hamilton Spectator(Mar 11, 2006)
Ontario's college
teachers walked off the job at midnight
Monday when talks with the provincial agency
representing their schools broke down.
It put about 150,000
students -- 10,000 at Mohawk College -- out
of schools, with just over a month left
before the last day of classes. Here's a
primer on what this dispute is all about.
WHERE DID THIS COME
FROM?
Negotiations between
the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU)
and the College Compensation and
Appointments Council had dragged on for more
than a year. OPSEU set March 7 as a strike
deadline last summer. The council made its
final monetary offer before Christmas. It
was rejected. Five days of talks collapsed
at 10:30 p.m. Monday. Pickets began Tuesday.
WHO IS STRIKING?
OPSEU represents
almost 500 teachers, librarians and
counsellors at Mohawk and about 9,100 in the
province. On Feb. 7, OPSEU members voted 81
per cent in favour of the strike. At Mohawk,
the pro-strike vote was 68 per cent which
local union president Fred Deys says
reflects positive steps taken by Mohawk
president MaryLynn West-Moynes.
OPSEU says Ontario's
Liberals want education quality and are
willing to pay for it, so it's time to take
a stand before colleges deteriorate further.
WHAT ARE THE ISSUES?
The two sides are
not far apart on salaries. OPSEU's main
demand is for changes in workload. They want
more faculty, which they say will lead to
smaller class sizes and more time for
students. The council says these demands are
unreasonably expensive in light of meagre
provincial funding grants and won't help
students as claimed.
The details are much
more complex.
WHAT ABOUT WORKLOAD?
A college teacher's
workload is a complex sum of teaching hours,
plus outside work like marking and
preparation.
It's not a
nine-to-five job because each teacher may
have a different mix of in-class and
non-class hours. The maximum is 44 hours a
week total time, including a maximum of 18
teaching hours a week.
But here's where
things differ. The council claims teachers
want to reduce their teaching hours to an
average of 12 a week from the current
average of 14 a week. OPSEU says this is
incorrect and its main concern is class size
and faculty hiring.
The council also
claims union demands for more faculty won't
help students, would cost $135 million and
must be dropped before a settlement.
The union counters
by saying that in the past decade or more,
college enrolment has risen while the number
of full-time faculty has declined. This
means larger classes and more marking out of
class, so it's time to cap classes at 40
students.
OPSEU says hiring
faculty would shrink class sizes, reduce
work outside of class and allow more
teaching within the 44-hour maximum. The
council says this won't help students and is
too costly when Ontario colleges get the
lowest provincial grants in Canada.
WHAT ABOUT MONEY?
Management says its
offer would increase salaries 12.6 per cent
to $94,277 in a four-year contract with no
increase to workload, making Ontario's
college teachers the best paid in Canada.
OPSEU says this isn't the truth. It says the
council is splitting and compounding
increases for effect, so that a 2 per cent
increase in September and 1 per cent raise
in April resemble a 3 per cent annual
increase. The union says it's really just
2.43 per cent a year.
OPSEU wants a
two-year contract with a 4 per cent raise in
each full year.
WILL STUDENTS LOSE
THEIR YEAR?
Not if history is
any guide. Strikes in 1984 and 1989 didn't
cost any student his or her year. A division
of the Ontario Labour Relations Board
advised the province when the strike risked
the academic year in both cases, which began
the move to back-to-work legislation.
In the 1980s, this
advice came after about 20 days of striking.
Speculation is that a spring strike requires
a faster resolution.
HOW WILL THEY MAKE
UP THE TIME?
College management
decides how time is made up. Mohawk's
president says this is a different situation
than in 1980s strikes, due to higher numbers
of mature students and the ability to use
computers to help finish missed work.
Possibilities may
include extending the term.
