WINGHAM, ONT. -- The Avon Maitland District School Board is taking an unprecedented step as it prepares for a winter with COVID-19.
“It’s the first time in the Avon Maitland School board that we’ve posted a position such as this,” says Paul Langis, Superintendent of Human Resources with the Avon Maitland District School Board.
The Avon Maitland Board, which encompasses Huron and Perth County, recently put out job postings for emergency unqualified teachers.
It's looking for people with a secondary school diploma, experience with children, but not a certified teacher.
The board says it's trying to be prepared for a winter of illness and last second cancellations, especially in their elementary schools, and it would only use the emergency unqualified teachers if supply teachers, local teaching students, or retired teachers couldn’t fill in.
“The regular classroom teachers would still prepared the lessons for that day, but this would provide the opportunity to have someone in the room," says Langis.
"It’s so we’re not in the position other boards have been in or that we could anticipate when you don’t have enough staff to have students in the building on any given day. We don’t want to have that happen because we know the inconvenience that causes at the school level and for parents,” he adds.
A local teacher’s union does not like the idea, calling it a slap in the face.
Shane Restall is president of District 8 of the Ontario Secondary School Teacher’s Federation.
"It is disappointing and unnecessary in my opinion. We have a host of secondary redundant (i.e.laid-off) teachers still underemployed, along with a list of secondary occasional teachers who are talking about how little work they have," he says.
"This feels like a slap in the face to those teachers. We also have a host of recent retirees that are an untapped and qualified source of work.”
Langis says the emergency unqualified teachers would only be used as a last resort.
“We’re not in a dire situation, it’s simply about being proactive in advance of possibilities,” he says.
So far there are no COVID-19 cases in any schools in Huron or Perth County.
