December 20th - Teachers take unpaid day off work

TORONTO, Dec. 19, 2013 /CNW/ - Schools across the province will be closed on December 20, 2013. This is an unpaid, non-working day for all permanent teachers in Ontario schools.

"Parents might be under the impression that this is a regular professional development day for teachers, but it is not," says James Ryan, President of the Ontario English Catholic Teachers' Association (OECTA). "Teachers will not be at work, nor will they be paid for that day."

During negotiations for the 2012 collective agreements, the government originally demanded that, in addition to an overall wage freeze, the teachers' salary grid be frozen for two years, with no future opportunity to buy back the salary grid movement lost during those years.

This meant newer teachers still moving up the salary grid would have borne a greater share of the salary freeze than their colleagues no longer moving on the grid.

The Memorandum of Understanding with the Ministry of Education allowed the delayed salary grid movement for newer teachers by having all permanent teachers take December 20, 2013 as an unpaid day.

"Both the delay in salary grid movement and the unpaid day for all permanent teachers in Ontario were the result of Dalton McGuinty's austerity agenda, which removed money from Ontario's classrooms," adds Ryan. "Negotiating the unpaid day helped mitigate the impact of those measures on many of our members."

OECTA represents the 45,000 professional women and men who teach all grades in publicly funded English Catholic schools in Ontario.

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SOURCE: Ontario English Catholic Teachers' Association

Michelle Despault, Director of Communications
416-925-2493 ext 509, [email protected]