Social Services Committee — Department of Education — 4 March 2007

2007-03-04

Newfoundland and Labrador — Committees

April 7, 2003 SOCIAL SERVICES COMMITTEE

The Committee met at 9:00 a.m in the House of Assembly.

MADAM CHAIR (Kelly): (Inaudible) we will get things started here this

morning. The first item, I guess, is that we are to be reminded that we always

introduce ourselves for the record. It was the Member for Placentia & St.

Mary's, Fabian Manning, who conducted the election of the Chair. My name is

Sandra Kelly, the newly elected Chair of the Social Services Estimates

Committee.

We will start by introducing the committee members and then we will move into

the regular proceedings. After we introduce the committee members we will talk

about a few procedural matters before we start this morning.

If I could ask each of you, starting with Fabian, to introduce yourselves as

committee members.

MR. MANNING: Good morning, Fabian Manning, MHA for Placentia & St.

Mary's.

MR. HEDDERSON: Tom Hedderson, MHA for Harbour Main-Whitbourne.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: John Ottenheimer, MHA for St. John's East. I am not on

this committee but I am here as critic in this department.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Ross Wiseman, MHA for Trinity North.

MS M. HODDER: Mary Hodder, MHA for Burin-Placentia West.

MR. BUTLER: Roland Butler, MHA for Port de Grave District.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Kevin Alyward, MHA for St. George's-Stephenville East.

MADAM CHAIR: This morning we are welcoming the Department of Education

for their estimates, and after we do these few procedural things we will start

right in with the minister's opening remarks and the introduction of his

staff.

I am told that we should settle procedural matters, such as the length of the

meeting. I think the length is standard three hours and we would agree this

morning that we will sit up until noon if necessary. Is that agreeable?

The matter of allocating speaking time, traditionally the minister has

fifteen minutes to introduce his estimates and the person responding has the

same amount. All other members have ten minutes to speak. Do we wish to follow

that as usual, that we will each take ten minutes in our turn?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MADAM CHAIR: Okay. Ten minutes, if necessary, I think is the way to do

it. Many times that length is not there.

I am also told that members may be addressed and referred to by name rather

than by district in committee. I am also told that as you speak you are to

introduce yourselves for the record.

So, without further ado we will move right to the Minister of Education.

MR. REID: Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

I am going to be brief. I would just like to introduce the individuals who

are here with me. To my left is Harold Press, the Deputy Minister of Education;

then we have Garry Hatcher, who is Director of School Services; Bob Young, ADM

of Finance and Administration; Gerald Galway, ADM of Programs; and David Pike,

Manager of Finance.

The department is still relatively new to me, even though I came out of the

classroom some years ago. So I am going to be relying on the officials in the

department to help me get through some of the questions you might have today.

With that, I will just turn it over to the floor.

MADAM CHAIR: That is pretty concise, isn't it?

CLERK: 1.1.01.

MADAM CHAIR: 1.1.01 has been called. Fabian, would you like to -

MR. MANNING: Just for clarification, Madam Chair. We are calling one

head. Can we flow through on the other heads or do you want us to go one head at

a time; the next one and the next one? If I have a question on 1.01, one

question on that in my ten minutes, and then I may have a question on 1.03, can

I just move ahead to that (inaudible)?

MADAM CHAIR: Okay. I think that is quite acceptable actually, and that

usually helps us time wise. If the minister can agree that we would start there

and then whatever questions you would like to ask in your ten minutes through

the documents is perfectly alright, and that would apply to everyone this

morning.

MR. REID: Can I ask a question of whoever is down in the control room, if

Kevin is down there, if the speakers to the headphones are connected this

morning because I cannot get my mine to work?

MR. MANNING: I cannot get my to work either. I was trying to hear when

you were introducing people that time.

MR. REID: So wake up down there, Kevin.

MR. MANNING: Okay, they are on now.

MR. REID: Okay, got it.

MADAM CHAIR: It's working now?

MR. REID: Yes, thank you.

MADAM CHAIR: Okay, good. Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I am just going to follow through a few line items first, if we could. On

1.1.01, Minister's Office, under Salaries there seems to be a drop. The

budgeted amount last year was $304,000, it was revised up to $318,000, and

requesting of $289,000 for this year. Can he tell us why that change is there?

MR. REID: Gone down, you mean?

MR. MANNING: Yes.

MR. REID: Some of the staff that I have are paid at a lower scale. They

are newer employees.

MR. MANNING: Pardon?

MR. REID: Some of the staff who work in the Minister's Office are newer

employees than the ones who were there previously.

MR. MANNING: Okay.

Executive Support; Salaries last year went from $562,000 budgeted to

$593,000, and then this year we are looking for $638,000. Again, it is an

increase.

MR. REID: Most of that would be as a result of the 5 per cent salary

increase and step progressions. You will find that in most of the headings, that

it a 5 per cent salary increase.

MR. MANNING: Okay. Is there anybody within the department itself on

contract service?

MR. PRESS: We have an assistant to the director of communications who is

on contract.

MR. MANNING: Can you give us a salary on that contract?

MR. PRESS: What is the salary of it?

MR. MANNING: Yes.

MR. YOUNG: It is $40,000.

MR. MANNING: Is that the only person on contract in the department?

MR. PRESS: That I am aware of. We have a number that are seconded

personnel, who are effectively seconded from the teaching system in order to

provide consultative services to things like the division of curriculum,

testing, evaluation, research and so on.

MR. MANNING: These people are taken out of the -

MR. PRESS: They are taken out of the teaching units. They are not

contract per se.

MR. REID: They have been replaced in the school though, I think, for the

most part.

MR. MANNING: Pardon?

MR. REID: They have been replaced by a teacher in the school. It is not a

case of just taking a unit out of the system and putting them into the

department. They have been replaced.

I know when my wife came in here in 1989 with me, she went substituting for

the first year. Then she got a contractual position for the next eight years

replacing an individual who went to the department. For all intents and

purposes, she never had a full-time job up until 1999.

MR. MANNING: There has not been any loss in the classroom because of

these people coming into the department?

MR. REID: No.

MR. MANNING: Okay.

MR. YOUNG: There is one other contractual person in the department. That

person is paid for by funds from the federal government and has to do with Adult

Basic Education. There is a specific project that we are doing right now and

that person is in our literacy branch and hired under the auspices of federal

funding.

MR. MANNING: Okay, that is 100 per cent federal funding?

MR. YOUNG: That is correct.

MR. MANNING: Again, Planning and Research, 1.2.04. We have a salary jump

which is a little bit more than the 5 per cent that the minister referred to.

Maybe somebody could explain it? On the budget amount last year it was $454,000,

it dropped to $420,000, but now this year we have a budgeted amount of $559,500.

MR. GALWAY: This amount includes some youth positions that we have been

able to get through a contract with the federal government, and that is a new

program.

MR. MANNING: Is this entirely funded from the federal government or is

this partially - is it a cost-share?

MR. PRESS: The biggest reason for that change in salary was achieving our

salary plan for last year we delayed the recruitment of two school improvement

specialists. So there was a savings for last year over the initial budget.

For next year we will be bringing those people in. So as of September, we

will have two new school improvement specialists who will come, and you will

notice the same thing under Transportation and Communications. If we did not

have them, there was no need for these people to be travelling, and next year it

will go back to its initial (inaudible).

MR. MANNING: Under the same heading, .05 Professional Services, can you

give us an explanation on the expenditures of $70,000 there?

MR. GALWAY: That expenditure is for research projects that have been done

in the department. For example, a couple of the ones that have been done this

year, we have done a study of semesterization, and the merits of moving to a

semesterized system.

Another contract that has been awarded through this subhead is for a study of

individual school reporting in the wake of the AIMS report that has been done.

We have been looking at how we can improve accountability at the school level,

and we have a fairly significant project there that is aimed at individual

school level reporting. Those are individual contracts for research projects

that have been done over the last year.

MR. MANNING: Moving ahead to 2.1.01.10, Grants and Subsidies: School

Boards, there is $345 million here. Is that teachers' salaries? What else

would be involved with that?

MR. YOUNG: That number is strictly the salaries for the teachers who are

in the system, regular teachers.

MR. MANNING: So the increase from $316 million to $345 million is based

on the 5 per cent.

MR. YOUNG: That is based mostly on salary increases, that is correct, and

other collective bargaining issues.

MR. MANNING: Okay.

MR. PRESS: It also includes step increases in general, cost increases in

addition to the 5 per cent.

MR. MANNING: Substitutes would be another allotment, wouldn't it?

MR. PRESS: That is correct.

MR. YOUNG: The other issue on that is the extra pay period. There is an

extra pay period in the year 2003-2004 versus 2002-2003.

MR. REID: That accounts for how much (inaudible) million dollars?

MR. YOUNG: Fifteen million dollars is the size of the teachers' payroll

per pay period.

MR. MANNING: Okay, so one extra pay period.

On the grants to school boards, apart from the teachers' and the substitute

teachers' employment benefits, I guess we come down to 2.1.02.10 School Board

Operations, Regular Operating Grant, can you tell me what the regular operating

grant for the Avalon West School Board is?

MR. YOUNG: I could give you an approximation. It would be approximately

$15 million. I can certainly clarify that through the course of the morning for

you.

MR. MANNING: Okay, I would appreciate that.

Also, when you are doing that, a breakdown of the school board, would I be

correct in saying that a school board decides - I am talking about the staff at

the school board office, not necessarily those out in the schools - the staff at

the school board office, the functioning of the expenses at the school board

office, that is all controlled - I do not know if controlled would be the proper

word but I will use that for now until someone comes up with a better one for me

- is that all controlled by the school boards themselves? Or when this grant is

passed over to the school boards, the $15 million, what jurisdiction does the

department have in relation to - I know in the expenditures of that fund, or is

it at the discretion of the school board how that money is expended?

MR. REID: It is at the discretion of the school board. Back when we did

the consolidation or the reform, Fabian, the school boards were permitted to

have a director or a superintendent and three assistant directors, and that was

pretty well it for the boards. They made a deal of some kind with the NLTA which

allowed them to have, I think, eight program co-ordinators -

WITNESS: Six.

MR. REID: - six program co-ordinators, which brought total personnel at

the office to ten. Since then, the board here in St. John's has seconded

teachers from the classroom. I think they have eight additional staff at that

board. These are teachers that are assigned to the board to do with as they

wish, I guess, is the answer Fabian.

MR. MANNING: Could I get a breakdown of the positions at the Avalon West

School Board?

MR. YOUNG: Just by way of clarification on that, do you want a breakdown

of the full staff out there, like secretaries and janitors and maintenance

workers?

MR. MANNING: Right from the director down. In the school board office is

what I am talking about, not out in the schools.

MR. YOUNG: It is not a problem to get it. We do not have that level at

the department but we certainly can get it for you from the Avalon West School

Board.

The minister is quite correct. When we do the allocation to the boards for

all of their funding, we allocate to the board. How they distribute that amongst

their individual staffs and organizations out there is a board decision.

MR. MANNING: I am just wondering, there is no set - there are ten school

boards in the Province, okay, and we have ten directors of education. We have,

as the minister just touched on, three assistants. That is not uniform across

the Province. Each school board can create its own list or whatever.

MR. REID: (Inaudible). It is not just a case of what happens at the board

level as well, but in each individual school. In some schools, for example, in

the board in here, neither the principal, the vice-principal, the guidance

counselor, nor the librarian teach a student. It varies from board to board,

school to school.

MR. MANNING: I would like to get into that a little bit further, but I

think the Chair is nodding her head at me now.

MADAM CHAIR: Yes, I am saying that the ten minutes is up, but also that I

either have to recognize you every time you speak or you have to identify

yourself when you start speaking.

WITNESS: Sorry.

MADAM CHAIR: We will start trying to do that now.

Mr. Press.

MR. PRESS: If I could, there are really three sources of human resources

that each of the boards would have. One is that what we allocate directly - a

director and assistant director and so on - would be allocated directly as part

of the Administration Grant, if you go down a bit further.

The second one would be any flexibility in their operating grant. That is

where they would hire everything from bus drivers to secretarial support and so

on.

The third would be the only other flexibility they would have, or source of

human resource, would be if they allocate or reallocate regular teachers from

their schools to the board office. In many cases, and this is why I want to wade

in on this a little bit, but you have to be really careful when you interpret

the numbers at board office because in many cases you will find itinerant

teachers for the hearing impaired, you might find speech language pathologists

located at board offices, and so on. In many cases, they are very legitimate

resources to have there because they serve on an itinerant basis in a number of

schools. The board office is really only a seat in order to meet with your

colleagues, debrief and so on, but effectively you are school-based personnel.

You just happen to be located physically at a board office.

MR. MANNING: In some cases, these people are taken out of the schools and

brought to school board offices; would that be correct?

MR. PRESS: Yes.

MR. MANNING: That is what I was trying to get at.

I guess I will come back later.

MADAM CHAIR: Okay.

Mr. Hedderson, would you like to start?

MR. HEDDERSON: (Inaudible).

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Ottenheimer.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just have a few questions.

MADAM CHAIR: Would you identify yourself, please?

MR. OTTENHEIMER: John Ottenheimer, MHA, St. John's East.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just have a few questions for the minister and his officials. I guess to

carry on, in some respects, from questions by Mr. Manning, I would like to

return if I may to 1.2.02 Administrative Support.

For example, in the short description at the beginning of the details we see

that there appears to be an overlap between the Department of Education and the

Department of Youth Services and Post-Secondary Education in terms of

administrative support. I am just wondering if maybe the minister or one of his

officials could comment on that in terms of that overlap. Why is it, I guess,

the Department of Education assumes that role as opposed to the other

department? Secondly, do we see a similar overlap whereby the Department of

Youth Services and Post-Secondary Education assumes some responsibility for the

Department of Education?

MR. REID: John, one of the reasons - Bob, right here at the end, is ADM.

for both departments. I will let you take it from there Bob.

MR. YOUNG: When the Department of Youth Services and Post-Secondary

Education and Education were split in 2001, it was agreed that there would be a

joint or a shared responsibility for finance and administration. As the minister

says, I am an ADM. in both departments, so the budget for both departments is

retained in the Department of Education for all administrative functions and

financial functions. There are no offsets or no additional funding of this

nature contained in the Department of Youth Services and Post-Secondary

Education. It is all budgeted for and accounted for in Education.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Is it only in this area of Administrative Support where

we see that overlap take place or are there other divisions within the

department where the overlap is also evident?

MR. YOUNG: No. This is, as far as I know, the only overlap area.

MR. PRESS: If I might. Last year another division, the Division of

Planning and Research, was located in a branch of Administration and Finance.

Since then, both departments have felt the need to have their own sort of

dedicated research base. So now you have two separate planning and research

functions in both departments.

The only area where there is a functional responsibility for both departments

is in the area of Finance and Administration.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Under heading 1.2.03, Assistance to Educational Agencies

And Advisory Committees, I wonder if the minister or one of his officials could

perhaps elaborate on when it talks about assistance for a number of educational

support groups and advisory committees. Exactly what types of support groups and

committees are we referring to? Could we have some detail as to exactly the role

that is played under this particular heading?

MR. REID: There are a whole bunch of them, John. One is the Women's

Institute and another one is the Federation of School Councils, the School

Boards Association, the School Councils Association, and a whole bunch of those.

MR. YOUNG: The largest expenditure in that area is for the Atlantic

Provinces Education Foundation. That is about $129,000 or $130,000 of that

total.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Is this a direct grant, Mr. Young, that would be paid by

the provincial Department of Education to that council, for example, and other

examples that the minister has given? Or is this assistance that is provided

from time to time?

MR. YOUNG: This is a direct grant that is paid, but is paid for on behalf

of all of the Atlantic provinces towards the operation of the Atlantic Provinces

Council. Our contribution in Newfoundland is $129,000, but it is a joint venture

of all four Atlantic provinces. So it is grant paid out directly to them.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Would all provinces pay equally? The Atlantic provinces,

would they pay equally or on a per capita basis?

MR. YOUNG: Per capita.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: I would like to go to the next

section there, if I may,

Madam Chair, 1.2.04, Planning and Research.

In response to an earlier question it was indicated that the federal

government plays a role in this particular area. I believe, Mr. Galway, you may

have referred to that, if I am not mistaken. I am just wondering, for example,

in a number of other headings when there are revenues from the federal

government it is clearly outlined within the Estimates that there are revenues

being received from federal government sources. However, I do not see it under

Planning and Research. Is there any reason why that is not shown? Maybe if you

could just elaborate on that point.

MR. GALWAY: My apologies, Mr. Ottenheimer, when I responded initially I

was referring to the Community Access Program. I thought Mr. Manning had moved

ahead to a subhead that was a little further along the way.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Okay. So, there are no federal government revenues in

this case?

MR. GALWAY: Not in this case.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Okay, thank you.

Madam Chair, another question on this particular point under Planning and

Research. I wonder if maybe the minister - or again, one of his department

officials - could elaborate on the issue of research, because it clearly states,

"Appropriations provide for policy formulation, research, evaluation and

strategic planning for the Department."

When we say research, exactly what are we referring to? Maybe if we could

have some examples of the type of activity that is taking place within the

department to meet the definition of research under Planning and Research?

MR. GALWAY: The research that goes on in the department, the planning and

research function refers broadly to the types of activities that wind up

producing things like the annual report of the Department of Education, for

example. We put out, periodically, from time to time, educational indicators

reports. You may recall the profile series of documents that have been produced

over the years. We also do annual reporting on performance measurement. We put a

lot of our performance measurement data on the Web, produce a lot of Web-based

systems; school improvement research, for example, providing information for

schools so they can produce their own annual school reports.

Some of the things I mentioned earlier, for example, the study of

semesterization to support some calls that we have had to move to a semesterized

system, those kinds of things would be included. Also, of course, the planning

and research group supports the minister and supports the executive in the

information that they require on a day-to-day basis.

MR. PRESS: If I could just add one point to that. Although that seems

like a lot, fundamentally a great deal of what we do is gather information and

analyze that information and so on, and we produce and report on that

information. It is significant.

The kind of baseline research that you would find here that one might

associate with an academic institution and so on, there is not a great amount of

money here to do that. When you look at it and sort of deconstruct it, you won't

find we have a lot of flexibility to do a lot of significant research in the

course of a year. One of the things, in our discussions with our school boards,

that we will focus on in the coming year or two is the achievement of boys, or

effectively the underachievement of boys, in relation to the overall achievement

process.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Press.

I would like to just proceed to the next

section under Teaching Services. We

touched on it a little while ago. I am interested in the specific reference to

Substitute Teachers. Under 2002-2003, in both budgetary and revised figures we

see approximately $2 million less being allocated.

I guess my question is really: How is it we see an estimate for 2003-2004

well in excess of $16 million for Substitute Teachers, from the point of view

that when we think of substitute teachers we think of teachers who are absent

from their duties through illness or compassionate leave or other legitimate

reasons? How is it we can forecast an increase for an allocation for a

substitute teacher allotment in advance, again approaching some $2 million

greater than the previous year?

MR. PRESS: It is up for many of the same reasons that the regular teacher

budget is up, salary increases and next year is a longer year, so there are an

extra five days on the length of the year. You would find that its projected

usage should remain relatively the same. However, the net cost and so on, use of

the days, will go up just like the regular teacher salary count will go up.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Mr. Press, you are saying that the increase in teacher

salary would be the predominant reason for such an increase?

MR. PRESS: And the length of the year. If the year is longer, then there

would likely be the need for, or there will likely be sick leave and other kinds

of non-discretionary leave during those five days as it would be during the

other 180.

MR. REID: They had an extra -

MR. PRESS: Then there is an extra pay period, I should say.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Okay.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Ottenheimer, your ten minutes -

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Pardon me?

MADAM CHAIR: Your ten minutes are up.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Okay.

MADAM CHAIR: So we will move to the next speaker please.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Wiseman?

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: If I could, there are a couple of points. I guess not

so much specifically with respect to the headings, but issues of float from the

operation. Before we could, I just want to clarify a point, a question from Mr.

Manning, about the board's discretion to allocate funding.

I gather from your comment, Minister, and that from Mr. Young, that the board

had some discretion in terms of how they reallocated funding. I understood that

there is some - the boards' grants are not block funding. It is line by line

budgeting in some categories, so there are some areas where it is directed and

the board does not have the discretion. There is, under the grants, particularly

the operating grants, only one area where they have some discretion and that is

in the area of curriculum. The rest is earmarked, isn't it? Is that correct or

has that changed?

MR. REID: For the most part, you are right. When it comes to teacher

allocations, Ross, the board can take them. If there is a set amount set aside

for teacher allocations, they can do with that what they want.

Also, in the last four or five years, anywhere where schools have been

closed, we have allowed boards to retain the savings from their operating costs.

For example, if there were three schools closed in a particular area and there

was only one remaining open, we would have allowed the boards to keep the

savings from the operating costs from the three schools that were closed. They

are supposed to used for - correct me if I am wrong, Bob - capital costs aren't

they, one-time projects?

MR. YOUNG: Yes, that would not be allocated for operational costs.

MR. REID: Well, I guess it would go in as - no.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Okay.

The other question I had was -

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Wiseman, could you identify yourself please?

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Sorry. Ross Wiseman again.

Under head 1.2.02.06 Purchased Services, the revised budget from last year

was from $263,000 up to $755,000. That increase came about as a result of what

expenditure?

MR. REID: Under 1.2.02.06?

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Yes.

MR. REID: I think that is, for the most part, insurance deductible on

public buildings, that was transferred from the Education Investment Corporation

to the department, and an increase in advertising and printing costs.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: The increase, just to clarify that -

MR. REID: The insurance deductibles used to be carried by the Education

Investment Corporation. Am I right, Bob?

MR. YOUNG: That is correct, Minister. For whatever reasons - we do not

fully understand ourselves - the insurance deductible for all government

buildings, including schools - but schools happen to be the predominant one - is

budgeted for in the Education Investment Corporation.

During the course of this year we had to use some of the deductible funding,

so that deductible was transferred from the Education Investment Corporation to

the Department of Education. That is the reason you see that substantial

increase from $263,000 to $755,000. It is the recapturing from the Investment

Corporation of the insurance deductible for government buildings.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: So the deductible, I assume, came about as a result of

claims.

MR. YOUNG: That is correct.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: And you had to pick up the deductible.

MR. YOUNG: We had to pick up the deductible. That is what it is for.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: So it is basically a one-time expense as a result of

losses last year on building claims.

MR. YOUNG : That is correct. You will notice that it goes back to the

$263,000 level. Again, however, if there are any circumstances which require the

deductible to be used, it has again been budgeted for and will be transferred to

the department if needed.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: The issue of school grants: in the Budget itself there

was an announcement of an additional $2.5 million to implement the changes in

the report called Facing the Challenges. Where would that be reflected in the

operating grants? What category would that be lumped in under?

MR. YOUNG: It is reflected under the Grants and Subsidies regular

operating grant component. In the budget for 2003-2004, you will see $76

million, $76,366,200; it is included in that.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: So, of that increase from $72 million up to $76

million, $2.5 million of it is as a result of that particular study.

MR. YOUNG: That is correct.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: If I could, Madam Chair, I said that I would like to

talk about some of the issues flowing from the Estimates or coming from other

documents. This document that was produced as a result of that work stoppage a

couple of years ago, the total price tag on that was something in the order of

$9.5 million and in this year's budget there is $2.5 million for that. I am

just wondering, Minister, if you could provide some comment for us. In the

executive

summary of that report, it talks about $9.5 million for a full year,

so the increased annual cost to implement the recommendations is $9.5 million

annually. You are now injecting $2.5 million in this year, and the report goes

on to talk about how it should be distributed in janitorial, secretarial and a

gamut of things.

The assumption now is there is only $2.5 million, so there is $7 million

short of the recommendations, so the recommendations will not be implemented all

at one time - that is just the assumption I am making. The other question

flowing from that - maybe you can comment at the same time - what is the

implementation strategy for government, and over what period of time, and what

would you foresee then doing next year and the following year?

MR. REID: You are right, Ross.

If you remember, we had a work stoppage last year that was directly related

to the secretarial and the janitorial staff at the schools. One of the areas

that was hardest hit by that was the one in my district (inaudible), so we had a

report written and authored by Phil Warren. In that, he looked at a number of

issues; janitorial and secretarial. He also looked at severance and things like

that for these individuals, which would have made up a fair - what was the exact

number that was allocated, that he recommended for that portion, Bob?

MR. YOUNG: There were four elements to Dr. Warren's report. The first

one was secretarial, and of the $9.5 million the secretarial component was $2.1

million. The second component was janitorial and maintenance. The component of

that in Dr. Warren's report is $2.9 million. The severance and related

collective bargaining issues are $2 million. The final $2.5 million was for the

implementation, as Dr. Warren saw it, of some IT support in the school system.

Those are the breakdowns of the $9.5 million.

What we have been appropriated is to address the key reason that the strike

occurred, which was related to secretarial time, janitorial and maintenance

time. That is a price tag of $5 million. With the implementation starting in

September we will need just a little over $2.5 million to effectively implement

that for the balance of the fiscal year - not the school year, but for the

fiscal year - starting in September.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Minister, if you do not mind, just so I can clarify

that.

If I understand you correctly, what you are saying is that the $2.1 million

for secretarial and the $2.9 million for janitorial maintenance, that total of

$5 million, it is the intent that the $2.5 million be allocated this year to

address those two areas specifically. That would take you to the balance of the

fiscal year. Now that you have committed - if you put the extra support in place

I assume then you are committing now, this year, to follow through with another

$2.5 million in next year's budget so you can cover off the balance of the

school year. Would that be a fair assumption?

MR. REID: Yes, that will take care of the seven-tenths of the school year

between September and when the new budget comes down in April.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Okay.

MR. REID: The other thing on that though is the IT portion, which was

good for how many million in recommendations, Bob?

MR. YOUNG: Two point five million.

MR. REID: Two point five. That was not really even part of the mandate of

the study when the individuals originally went out to look at it, because the

study came about as a result of the strike that we had last fall with the

janitorial and secretarial staff. That was sort of an addition that was put in

there when they went out to do discussions with those affected. The other thing

about it is that we will be talking with NAPE and CUPE in the next few weeks to

determine exactly where we are going to put that $2.5 million; how it is going

to be best used.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: When you say best used, it is going to be used for

those two categories, is that correct?

MR. REID: Yes, but we will be talking to them about what they actually

want to do with it, whether they want to lengthen the number of hours that these

individuals work or increase their pay, I guess, of (inaudible).

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Thank you.

Just to continue on in that vein of discussion. The other $2 million - and I

understood from the comments in the report that you are right, minister, the

technical support part was not a part of the original engagement. But, there is

a recommendation that $2.5 million is necessary for technical support within the

system. I guess my question is very specifically to that particular point and

what your plan might be, because in your budget you are announcing also $5

million over two years to go into the Centre for Distance Learning and

Innovation and $2.5 million in this particular year. That has been a major

thrust.

In your Budget and the Speech from the Throne, there is a very clear message

about your commitment to technology in the system. You are talking about making

broadband access to all schools, talking about having computers in every

classroom, and talking about investing large amounts of money into technology.

The last time I saw an inventory of computer equipment in the school system in

the Province, most of it was quite old, quite dated. As I understand, most

school boards are in desperate need of more technical support to support that

kind of technology. What we have out in a lot of systems now is relying on

classroom teachers to do the troubleshooting on computers.

Minister, I ask for your comments about how you reconcile that kind of an

administrative and budget decision when you pour out hundreds of millions of

dollars into technology and then not be prepared to put a couple of million or a

couple of hundred thousand dollars into technical support to maintain the stuff

when it is out there.

MR. REID: I guess it is a couple of million dollars here and a couple of

million dollars there that gives us the deficit we are currently operating under

this year. I guess on any given day you either get criticized for spending too

much or spending too little, but you are right. Right now it is board personnel

and teachers in the schools who keep that equipment up and running. Under an

ideal situation you would go out and spend an additional $2.5 million or $5

million to hire technicians. We would certainly like to do that and we will move

in that direction in the future, but right now we just do not have the money to

do it.

With regard to the computer equipment that you were saying in some cases is

old and obsolete, that is not the case in all schools. I just opened a new

school in Old Perlican on the weekend, a beautiful facility. The equipment that

they have in there is relatively new. So, most of it is in the high to mid-range

in terms of technology.

You mentioned the broadband. With the money we have for broadband this year

we are hoping to be able to go into some of the remote and rural areas of the

Province and bring these individual communities, and the people in them, up to

par with the technology that we have on the Avalon Peninsula and St. John's

with regard to the speed of the Internet which will help them for sure, as well

as us in terms of distance education.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: One other question with respect to the report. Two

million dollars for severance, sick leave and other collective bargaining

leaves. I go back to some of the questions that my colleague was asking about

the issue about budgeting for relief. I am looking at the annual report for the

Avalon East School Board. They comment that: Again this year a change was made

against the district's operating expenditures for overruns attributed to the

use of substitute teachers. This expenditure is non-discretionary given the

nature of the Newfoundland and Labrador Teachers' Association collective

agreement.

I understand, from looking at some of the other annual reports of boards,

that the issue of funding sick leave is a significant challenge, because in that

category of operating grants that there is some discretion around, all of the

extra sick leave costs, whether it is under the teachers' contract or under

the NAPE support or CUPE support collective agreements, that is where that money

comes from and that is the area for instructional material. So, every time there

is an increased cost associated with sick leave it comes out of the

instructional material budget at the board level. It appears that boards are

caught in a situation where they have a collective agreement that binds them to

cover that cost and they are pulling it out of the classroom resources to over

it, because it is not being funded for, which is the reason for this

recommendation of $2.2 million. The $2 million, I guess, is in recognition of

that dilemma the boards have.

MR. REID: What, with regard to substitute paying?

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Yes.

MR. REID: Obviously, Ross -

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: The sick leave pay.

MR. REID: The sick leave pay. Obviously, if you are spending $16 million

a year on substitute pay for sick leave, that appears to be a problem. When you

think that our payroll is - what, Bob?

MR. YOUNG: Four hundred and nine million.

MR. REID: You have $409 million a year in teacher payroll. That is a

sizeable chunk of change. Obviously, we would like to see sick leave reduced,

but it is my understanding that teachers get 1.5 days per month for sick leave.

Am I right? Obviously, not all teachers use those, but for various reasons

substitute pay is high.

Some of the comments you just made, I think Bob wants to clarify for you.

MR. YOUNG: It is not a matter of clearing up, but just for amplification.

The teachers' payroll, the sick leave and so on for teachers' payroll, is

budgeted with the teachers' payroll system. We budget discretionary and

non-discretionary leave to boards on the basis of prior years experience, so we

don't have any magical formula for it. We work with the boards to try to put

in wellness programs, back to work programs and so on, so that we can get the

teachers back into the classrooms. That is budgeted for specifically under

teachers' payroll. It is not budgeted as part of the operations of various

boards. The boards do have to fund the sick leave requirements for janitors and

secretaries but not for teachers or substitutes. That is covered under a

different allocation provided by the department. So, the $2 million that you

referred to in Dr. Warren's report is not a charge against the teachers, it is

a charge against sick leave requirements for other support staff at the board

levels.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Are you telling me that at no time does the board's

operating grants get charged with any costs associated with substitute teachers?

MR. YOUNG: That is correct. All substitute teachers are handled at the

departmental level. We provide each of the boards with an allocation for

substitute teachers, both discretionary and non-discretionary. In point of fact,

if the boards do not spend that allocation then we have, from the department's

perspective, allowed them to manage that within their budget.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: If they overspend, it is charged back to the department

and not to the board's grants?

MR. YOUNG: What we do is we provide them with an allocation for their

substitute teachers, for both discretionary and non-discretionary, and it is

within the board's responsibility to manage that. Beyond that, we don't play

a role, except that if they do have an overrun we can look with the board to

look at offsets. They may have a surplus in discretionary and a budget deficit

in non-discretionary. We can work with the board to see what is going on there.

If necessary, we can provide - we have very limited funds to do so - some

additions to meet with the boards concerns.

The note that you have from the St. John's Board is one where they are

saying they have a deficit in their non-discretionary. I would probably suspect

they have a surplus in discretionary and we can offset.

MADAM CHAIR: Could I interrupt here, please?

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Sure.

MADAM CHAIR: We are well past our ten minute time limit here. Mr.

Aylward, do you have any questions at this time?

MR. K. AYLWARD: If Mr. Wiseman wants to finish I can go a few more

minutes.

MADAM CHAIR: Then we will start the circle around again, I guess.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: I don't want to take up (inaudible) your time. I can

come back later. I have a few other points I want to cover off.

MR. K. AYLWARD: It will only take a couple of minutes.

MADAM CHAIR: Okay.

Mr. Aylward.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Madam Chair, congratulations on your election, by the

way. I thought it was a very wise choice of the committee, better than one I

know of anyway over here, sitting in this chair.

Mr. Minister, congratulations on your new post.

MR. REID: Okay.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Your previous minister, you have very big shoes to fill.

She did a very good job, I thought. I am sure you are up to the task, of course.

I want to just express my appreciation to the Department of Education for

funding for renovations for Belanger Memorial. We just recently saw completion,

I think it was almost $4 million at the end. That was one of the worse off

schools of the Province in the Codroy Valley. I believe that renovation has

really increased the level of education for the children of the Codroy Valley.

The parents are very supportive. The parents' committee worked very hard to

make that happen and because of the investment fund that we have, the capital

fund, that is one big positive that has come out for my district. They are very

pleased with the outcome, and I must say, we collectively are.

Also, in St. Joseph's and St. George's, the school there has also been

renovated. We just did a ceremony there; another $3.5 million. I very much

appreciate the fact that it came out of the educational fund, the investment

fund, for capital construction and for schools. Again, we saw the closing of a

high school in Stephenville Crossing. It allowed an amalgamation of schools

there. The benefits are clearly now for the youth of the St. George's and

Stephenville Crossing areas who now benefit from a much better and improved

system.

Also, I am pleased to see that the CAP Program, more funding for that has

been found for Internet use in our schools. In my district that means a lot. As

a matter of fact, it is a big rural district. Besides Stephenville, it includes

right down to the end of Codroy Valley, in that area. That CAP Program provides

free Internet access to residents also, which is very important. In five

different locations now the CAP Program is in my district. So I am very pleased

with that.

On the overall, I would also like to ask just one question, as to - I noticed

the recent figures on dropout rates for young people in the school system have

receded in the last few years, that they seem to be going in the right direction

for us when it comes to dropout for youth in high schools. It seems as if some

of the programs are working, or having an influence over people staying in

school. I just wondered what your thoughts were on - what you plan to do to

continue that in the coming period of time.

MR. REID: Thank you.

I would like to be able to clarify something, Kevin, because there are a

number of people out there who are thinking that we are not reinvesting the

money we have saved since reform back into the system. In actual fact, since

1997-98 we have spent $175 million in new construction and redevelopment of

schools. We have built twenty-three brand new schools and we have redeveloped

forty-nine others. When you look at some of the redevelopments, basically, all

that is left of the existing old school are the outer walls.

Most people think that this is money we have saved from consolidation since

reform. In actual fact, we have given back to the boards the money that we have

saved from consolidation. We are not charging the new schools against that fund.

For example, we are building a new school in my district, on New World Island,

for a cost of around $8.5 million. We are going to be closing four schools. Most

people would assume that we are taking the money from the closure of those four

schools to pay for the new one; we are not. We are leaving the operating costs

of those four schools with the board for the next three years, which will come

to roughly around $500,000. Even when the three years are up, that money will be

then taken back and redistributed amongst boards for capital improvements to

other schools around the Province. So we are not taking any money out as a

result of reform or consolidation. In fact, that $175 million is new dollars

that is put into the system.

These schools - like the one I seen on the weekend and the three that we seen

up on the Northern Peninsula a month ago - are excellent facilities. The kids

are really happy to be in them. First when you talk about closing two or three

schools in an area you hear some rumbling amongst parents, but in the case of

the school down in Old Perlican the kids are delighted. They are coming down

from Winterton and from Northern Bay in the other direction. The kids are

absolutely delighted to be in the school. They have new friends. As a result,

they are able to offer far better programs in each of these schools.

To get back to what you said about graduates, I suppose less than a

generation ago we had roughly 50 per cent of our school population who were

graduating with a high school education. Today we are up over 90 per cent.

Eighty-odd per cent - I think it is 84 per cent, I am not sure - 84 per cent of

those graduates are going on to post-secondary education.

Whereas back when we

were graduating 50 per cent or 54 per cent of our students - only 50 per cent of

them were going on to post-secondary education. So, in actual fact, twenty or

twenty-five years ago only 25 per cent of the kids who entered school in

kindergarten were going on to post-secondary when they graduated. Today that is

more like 70 per cent because you have 80 per cent of ninety who are graduating.

I even notice it since when I started teaching in 1982 on New World Island. Our

dropout rate was fairly significant but that is not happening anymore. I think

it is a result of not only better facilities but also better curriculum and

better teaching staff and things like that, that are certainly helping. We have

reinvested everything that we had back into the education system and we are

committed to continuing to do so, along with putting extra money in, because

this year even though we could have taken out 378 teachers we are investing 212

back into that system at a cost of $12 million or $14 million. It certainly

helps and we are happy to be able to do it. We are going to continue to make

strides in that direction, and we are committed to doing it.

MADAM CHAIR: Thank you.

MR. REID: Those cap sites you are talking about as well are great

because, like you said, it gives not only Internet access to individuals using

those sites, the students, but it also gives the community access. I know the

one in my district, the one on New World Island, that went in there a few years

ago, is being used by the whole town. When we get this broadband up and running,

that will also help some of these sites and it can be used for purposes other

than educational ones. It could be used for tourism or anything else.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Just to say that the Internet and all that, that is

providing, that was not there when I was in school years ago but now the access

to that also. I know you are doing some courses, some distance learning. I am

interested in hearing a little bit more about that because, to me, that really

is - I have heard from a number of students in my district, some of them are

using it and they just take it as - we kind of take it as something that is new

and different, but a number of them have been on the Internet for ten years or

eight years or seven years. Some of these children are youth and they are

growing into it and they just see this as a way of learning. I find that we are

pretty innovative from what I see of the programming that we can offer to the

rural centres. Where you have smaller class sizes and you might not have the

teachers on the staff, this is an excellent way to be able to provide that

education. Just a thought from you, hon. minister, as to where you see that?

MR. REID: Ideally, you would rather have a teacher in each classroom who

is qualified to teach the subject that he or she is teaching, but that is not

possible in a lot of places in rural Newfoundland and Labrador, and neither is

it possible in other places across the country, in rural areas across the

country. I had the opportunity a couple of weeks ago to log on with the

students, some of the students around the Province who were doing these courses

through the Internet, and I was very surprised at the comments that some of the

students were making about how they enjoyed it and it gave them the opportunity

to do courses that they would not otherwise be able to do.

It is not so much not being able to provide teachers in certain instances,

because I think I said to John Ottenheimer last week when we talked about

student-teacher ratios, we have somewhere around fifty or less than fifty

students on Change Islands. We have eight teachers. That is a considerable

number of teachers for so few students, but even with that number of teachers

they are still doing some courses through distance education because the

teachers who are on the distance education are far more qualified to teach that

particular subject than maybe some of the ones who currently exist in the

schools. So, in that light, it is certainly a good move.

I had the opportunity as well to visit Burgeo. I do not know if many of you

have heard of it, the BBS, the Burgeo Broadcasting System. Boy, they have the

state-of-the-art. Not only do you get the audio, but you get the visual. They

had a class in Ramea hooked up to a teacher in Burgeo and it is two-way. You can

see the students and they can see you. You can zoom in on the board; you can do

anything. It is just like being in the classroom. You can even turn around and

take a yap out of one of the students who is not paying attention in Ramea, from

Burgeo. It is simply amazing technology, and I would like to be able to see the

technology that they have spread around the Province because it is even better

than what we have in distance education.

On that South Coast, not only have they gone to Ramea but they have gone to a

number of communities up and down the coast, and we have to try and move more in

that direction. They had some help from the federal government some years ago to

set that up, but it is simply amazing what they have there.

MADAM CHAIR: Thank you very much, Mr. Minister.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Thank you, Madam Chair.

MADAM CHAIR: We can have a brief coffee break if we like now, or we can

individually go out and have a cup of coffee, whichever you prefer. A ten-minute

coffee break is in order, though, unless you prefer to do it individually.

MR. REID: I cannot do it individually, unless you don't mind if I leave

for a cigarette.

MADAM CHAIR: We will take a ten-minute coffee break in deference to the

minister. Shall we agree, Committee members?

Okay. We will reconvene at 10:20 a.m.

MR. K. AYLWARD: Moved and seconded.

Recess

MADAM CHAIR: Order, please!

We will get back at it again.

Ms Hodder, as we are going through, do you have any questions at this time or

we will we go on to Mr. Manning?

MS M. HODDER: I certainly do not have any questions this morning, but I

would certainly take just a second to commend the minister and the department,

and to thank them sincerely for all of the co-operation that I have received

from them over the years. I will say to the minster, I know you are new in this

department but if you do as good a job with this one as you have done with

Fisheries there will nobody have any complaints, I am certain.

We just have one issue that is facing my district at this particular time,

and I think we are going to have a meeting later today, and that is concerning

teacher allocation. I think that just stems from the fact that we have a couple

of schools in my district, like Petit Forte and South East Bight, where we have

like three teachers for twenty-two or twenty-three students in South East Bight

and there is one teacher for four students in Petit Forte. That, of course, cuts

into the larger schools. I guess it is the problem that we are experiencing in a

lot of places across the Province, and is something that we can hopefully

address.

Again, I want to sincerely thank all of you and I will pass it along to the

next person.

MADAM CHAIR: Thank you, Ms Hodder.

I am told that the recording people are concerned that they can only have one

mike on at a time and that I have to start recognizing people back and forth so

they are able to anticipate which

mike to turn on.

Mr. Manning, if you would like to start your questioning again.

MR. MANNING: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I will get back to a few of the earlier questions I was asking before,

quickly, if I could, on the contract to service. Mr. Young, I think you told me

there is an assistant to the Director of Communications for $40,000. Could you

tell me who that is?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: The name is Nora Daley.

MR. REID: From your district? It almost sounds like she might be from his

district.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: We will have to check that out.

I just want to get back, if I could, just to follow up on what Ms Hodder just

mentioned that time, and that is the allocation of teachers to the schools. The

minister says it is the decision of the school board itself. The flexibility of

the school board to in some cases take people, I think the deputy mentioned

earlier, out of the classroom, bring them to the school board office and spread

them out over a certain amount of schools, such different programs or whatever

the case may be. That flexibility to understaff a school in that case, or to

overstaff another school, or to take staff into the school board office, whose

decision is that?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Minister.

MR. REID: That is the school board. Not necessarily, Fabian, when taken

from the classroom and put at the board office, are they distributed out amongst

all the schools. There are some instances where these people just remain at the

board office and have little or nothing to do with any of the schools. They are

just doing administrative work at the board office.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: Okay.

MR. REID: We allocate based on a formula to each individual school board.

It is up to the school board how many teachers they put in each of the schools

underneath their jurisdiction. If they want to pull a teacher, for example, out

of one the schools in your district and put into the board office that is

completely within their discretion to do so.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: I just have to ask these questions for clarification,

because questions are being asked to me. If there is a student-teacher ratio

that is ordered - I will use the word ordered - by the Department of Education,

the minister says one teacher per thirteen students or fifteen students or

whatever the case may be. If that is supposed to be the case and the school

board then decides that they are going to take a teacher out of a school, or the

principal, vice-principal, resource teacher is not going to teach in that

school, what happens to the law that says one teacher per thirteen students?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Minister.

MR. REID: There is no law. All we are saying is that the student-teacher

ratio in the Province is this, where you take the number of teaching units,

wherever they are, and divide it into the number of students. There is no law

that says, for example - is it Mobile High school you have?

MR. MANNING: No, Laval (inaudible).

MR. REID: There is no law that says there cannot be seventy students in a

class in Laval. It is entirely up to the board how they allocate these students.

What we are saying is that, across the Province, the average per teacher ratio,

student-teacher ratio, is 13.5.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: That is for your teaching units, Mr. Minister, but if you

have four teachers in a school -

MR. REID: That is right.

MR. MANNING: - who are not teaching, and you have a possibility of one or

one-and-a-half units taken out of that school and brought to the school board

office, that ratio does not jive.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Minister.

MR. REID: You are right, it does not, but that is a decision that is made

by the school board and in some cases the administration at a particular school.

I taught, for example, in New World Island at Coaker Academy. The principal

in that school taught part time; the vice-principal taught half time.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hatcher.

MR. HATCHER: I will probably try this way to clarify it a little bit.

From the teaching services there is a bulk number of units allocated to a

district. Within that block, there are three or four types of units allocated to

board offices. There is a director of education, two assistant directors from

the teacher allocations - there is usually another one hired from the board

operating grants - there are six program specialists. These are all teaching

base units. The program specialists are program people. The next group are the

itinerants, as the deputy referred to, educational psychologists and these kinds

of people who work throughout the district.

In addition to that, the minister referred to units that are put in the board

office from this other allocation, the 700 or 800 units that are allocated. The

board has the freedom to do that. Many boards have put in categories which they

call associate assistant directors. These associate assistant directors are

teaching units that would otherwise have been in the classrooms. Some boards

also put in additional program specialists, other than the six. They may put an

extra one or two in there, and that is the eight that the minister referred to

earlier.

The ones that would normally be allocated are the directors, assistant

directors, program specialists and the itinerants like Ed. Psych. and those. The

others who come in are additional Ed. Psych., additional program specialists, or

these associate assistant directors of education. That is the group that would

come from the teaching block. It is not always easy to identify which school

they would have been in, but they would come from the total number that would be

allocated to the district.

I do not know if that helps clarify it.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: It clarifies it to an extent, Mr. Hatcher.

The problem I am having is that it seems to be that the allocation of, or the

perception, I should say, of how many students per teacher is convoluted for the

fact that it is not exactly - to say a uniform policy or uniform comment would

be 13.5 per teacher, but then in the situation in my district, as an example,

you take what is in the school board plus what is not teaching in the schools

and that number is way out of whack.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Minister.

MR. REID: You are probably right.

I can tell you something else that complicates it as well, Fabian, and that

is the number of courses that a particular board or a particular school wants to

offer.

For example, AP classes, Advanced Placement classes - and your colleague

sitting next to you would probably know this - are usually very small. If you

Level III, you probably might be in a class with less than ten students.

Obviously, if you are teaching in a class with less than ten students then

somebody in that school has to pick up the slack and they are going to have

larger classes. That is only one example.

Another example for you is, while French is taught in most schools in the

Province, we have courses in Russian and courses in Spanish being taught in

schools in St. John's. So if you are going to teach French and you are going

to teach Spanish, I would assume there are going to be fewer students in that

class, then that throws the student-teacher ratio out of whack as well.

It is up to the board and to the principal - and your colleague was a

principal - whether or not they want to offer that particular course. If you are

going to offer Spanish, then you have to find a Spanish teacher in your class.

You have to find someone on your staff to be teaching that Spanish. When you are

doing that, are you placing a heavier burden on the language teacher or the

geography teacher by offering Spanish or Russian? That is a decision that is

made at the board level and at the school level.

As a government, we could have put an additional 500 teachers in the system

this year and it could not have even affected the size of classes around the

Province because it would be up to the boards and the schools how they were

deployed. You might want to offer a course in something that only three or four

students want to take. So, even if you had another teacher in your school, it

would not drop the student-teacher ratio in a particular class.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Press.

MR. PRESS: I just wanted to make a short comment on the difference

between - I think this is where you are going - the PTR and class size, because

there is a disconnect. There is definitely a disconnect, but they are used for

different purposes.

The PTR is one that is really used as a measure of a province's commitment

to teaching. What it measures is really the ratio between the number of students

that you have in your province and the number of classroom-related or

school-related personnel. This is done and calculated out of British Columbia.

It is one which all provinces and territories participate in, including

Statistics Canada, in order that we can ensure that what you quote in

Newfoundland and Labrador is the same relative (inaudible) what has been quoted

in P.E.I. and Ontario and Alberta. What is shows clearly is that we have not

only the lowest, but the lowest by far, of any province or territory in Canada,

a PTR of 13.4, and it will remain that way next year.

Whereas in Canada as a

total, which includes Newfoundland, it is 16 per cent and getting higher. Even

that clearly shows, when you deconstruct it, is that a school board in Labrador

or the Northern Peninsula and so on, its PTR is significantly lower than 13.4

per cent. In fact, it is probably pretty close to ten - ten to one - and in St.

John's it is a little bit higher. St. John's, if you compare it with urban

boards, is significantly lower than any urban board in the rest of Canada.

If you look at class size, no, it does not. In our educational staff record,

which is one we do every three years, and we are doing it this year so we should

have some good information for next fall on the class size, the class sizes

range from twenty to twenty-two, which again is very, very low when you look at

comparable class size data across the nation. But there is definitely a

disconnect between the PTR, which is a measure of basically school personnel,

which would include principals, guidance counselors, itinerant staff and so on,

and actual class sizes, because in many cases you will see in urban areas

significantly higher class sizes in subjects like music. In choral music, it may

be desirable to have a fairly large class size. In other areas, such as Russian,

it is not desirable to have a large class size.

MADAM CHAIR: Thank you, Mr. Press.

Mr. Manning, do you have other questions?

MR. MANNING: Yes, I do.

For the Avalon West School Board, would I be correct in saying there is an

allotment of teachers? An allotment of teaching units, I should say.

MR. REID: Yes. I will give you what they were last year, Fabian.

In Avalon West we have full-time student equivalence of 9,291; full-time

teacher equivalence of 690, which gave a ratio of 13.5 to 1. That is right on

the average for the Province. Now, in Labrador, for example, the pupil-teacher

ratio was 12.5.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: These teaching positions, does the department know how many

of those are located at the school board office?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Reid.

MR. REID: Yes, we can determine how many of those teachers are at the

board office.

MR. MANNING: Is that information available?

MR. PRESS: We can get it. We will get it for you, but, rest assured, what

we have found out in the past is that it ranges from zero - some boards have

none; they have reallocated none to the board office - to one, sometimes two, so

whatever we find - with the exception of Avalon East. The likely response is

very, very few.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: Is the information available about how many teaching units

are not teaching within the school?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Reid.

MR. REID: I guess if we had to find out, we could; but, Fabian, that

would be up to the principal, I would assume.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: I am not saying about the decision. Is the information

available per school in the Avalon West School District, of how many teaching

units -

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: Do we have that information? Yes.

MR. MANNING: Okay. Is that available? Can that be made available?

MR. REID: There might be some problem with that as well. I know one

school, for example, where the librarian is full time, but the librarian does

not teach.

MR. MANNING: Yes, that is the way I understand it.

school, or math, and I sent some kids to the library, I would have to accompany

those kids.

MR. PRESS: Mr. Manning, that level of detail is very difficult to get

unless you have a very detailed kind of question here that goes out to not just

the school but the individual teacher, and that is the forum - the Educational

Staff Record, it is called - that we are doing in this school year, that the

last time we did it was three years ago. We recognize that is probably a bit

dated, fairly accurate but a bit dated. We have that information out, that the

analysis, or the information back to you - I am guessing now - would probably be

late May or maybe early to mid-June, before we will have the information for you

on that, but we will be able to give it to you on a school basis.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: Fabian, probably the best place where that information could

come from would be the school, if the school council were to request that

information of the school and the board. You mean to tell me that the principal

of a school would not give that information to the school council?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: The board will not release the information; that is why I am

asking for it here.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: That surprises me, when you consider that it is an elected

school board and that the individuals who are elected from your community are

actually the boss of the people who work at that administrative office. It is

the first I have heard of that and I find that to be very strange, that they

will not release the information to the board or to the school council.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Galway.

MR. GALWAY: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Manning, as the deputy points out, we have just about completed our

Educational Staff Record. I think we have a participation rate there of about 90

per cent. We would like to have 100 per cent and we are working on just cluing

that up.

As the deputy quite rightfully points out, that information on an individual

basis could be available from that survey. I suspect it will, however, be a

month or so, probably towards the end of May, that the information will be

available and we certainly would be able to provide it at that time.

MR. MANNING: Okay.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: There is another thing, too, Fabian that figures into that. It

is that when you are talking class size, some schools give a certain number of

preparation periods per cycle to their teachers, and that varies among schools.

I know when I taught on New World Island we had one a day and we had a six-day

cycle at that time. At any given time in the day there were five or six of us in

the staff room because we all got a period off a day. That also has an impact on

the number of students that are in a particular class at a particular period

during the day,

whereas other schools have a lower number of prep periods.

I am very surprised to hear that information is not readily available to an

elected school board and to an elected school council. That was certainly not

the intent of the legislation.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: The questions that I have been asked by some members of the

school councils in my district certainly leave me to believe that is not the

case, Mr. Minister, so I will leave that with you.

Back to Mr. Young, I believe. When you give me a breakdown of the personnel

at the school board office, and include the positions they hold, their names and

their salaries, and the conditions of their contracts, would that information be

made available? The breakdown of the personnel at the school board office?

MR. YOUNG: The answer is yes. We can certainly get that information but I

am not so sure that we can release the salary levels of the individuals. I would

have to check that against the Freedom of Information Act, but we certainly can

release to you the names of the persons at the board office, and their

positions.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning, have you completed your questioning?

MR. MANNING: No, not yet. Is my time up now?

MR. REID: May I comment on that?

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: I have a question to ask on that as well, Bob, if you do not

mind.

If a teacher is seconded from the school to the school board office, I would

assume that the salary scale that they left at the school, for example, if you

had a fifth grade, you get paid at a certain level. If you go to the school

board and there is an additional salary paid, or an additional amount paid,

where does that money come from, Bob? Does it come from the board office or does

the government pick up the tab for the additional salary you would be paid at

the board?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: Thank you.

If the seconded teacher is put into one of the areas, Mr. Hatcher referred to

it earlier, as an associate assistant, any differential between the salary that

is recorded on the teachers' payroll and what may be paid to that individual

is the responsibility of the school board. They would have to find that money

within their own operations, not from within the teachers' payroll system. So,

if there is a differential paid to a program specialist or a differential paid

to one of the assistant associates, because of the fact they may be doing work

with the boards and it requires them to be paid higher than, for example,

principals, then the board has to pay that tab.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Manning.

MR. MANNING: Mr. Young, if I could get back for a second to the salaries,

I could sit down here today and tell what your salary is.

MR. YOUNG: I beg your pardon?

MR. MANNING: I said, if I could get back to the salaries of the people at

the school board office, I can sit down here today and tell what your salary is,

and each one of you guys over there. Wouldn't that be made available to me,

what the salaries are the school board office? Wouldn't that be public domain?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: The answer is, I would have to check it out. I thing you are

correct but I would have to ask the question first, but I have no difficulty. It

is readily available; I am sure it is. It is just a question on salaries,

whether or not that falls into the domain of personal information if we release

it, but I have no difficulty in checking it out and getting back to you on that.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: With regard to that point, Fabian, I think it was laid down in

the legislation or the regulations exactly how much each of the directors would

be paid. Am I correct?

MR. YOUNG: There are different pots of money we are talking about here

now. When it comes to teachers and Directors of Education and two of the

Assistant Directors of Education, they are paid from the teachers' payroll,

teachers services.

With respect to the operating grant, however, that is a different category, a

completely different category. The operating grant would provide for the staff

at the board office, the secretaries, the janitors and so on. There are no

teachers included in the operating grant except for any differentials that are

paid to a teacher who comes to the board office and is given a differential.

That comes from board operating grants, but the salary of the teacher coming in

is continued to be paid for under teaching services, not under the operating

grant of the board.

MR. REID: You did not really answer my question, Bob. When we established

the new boards in 1997, did we lay down what a director should be paid based on

the population in the schools?

MR. YOUNG: Each of the Directors and Assistant Directors of Education has

a contract with their board and they negotiate with their board the contracts.

All contracts must be returned to the Department of Education and approved by

the minister. The level of salary in those contracts should be the same as the

executive compensation plan of government, and that is what they are to be paid.

If they are paid anything over and above that, then that is obviously an issue

for the board. We pay point on scale in relationship to the scales provided by

the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. The act provides for the provision of four

people, a director and three assistant directors. As I said earlier, the

director and two of the assistant directors are paid for under teaching

services. The third assistant director is the Assistant Director of Finance and

Administration in each of the board offices. They are paid for out of the

administration grant of the board.

MR. MANNING: Is it a possibility that the ten Directors of Education in

the Province are receiving ten different salaries?

MR. YOUNG: That is correct, because each one of the directors is on a

contract and are also on pay scales that are different, depending on the size of

their boards. For example, the size of Avalon West is different from the Vista

Board in Clarenville. So, the director would be classified different, as I am

classified different from other ADMs of government and so on. There is a

classification process that is engaged in with each one of the directors and

assistant directors and they are paid based on the classification.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: Now they are (inaudible) it is just as well to continue. Some

boards have even gone beyond that and taken money from the board to pay the

directors even more than is prescribed under government.

MR. MANNING: So, there is a possibly monies taken out of the operation

plan to add on to salaries of not only the director but other people in the

staff office, too?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: That is a possibility, yes.

MR. MANNING: Is that information available in regards to the differential

in the salaries of the Directors of Education?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: That would have to be obtained from the boards. We do not keep

that information at our offices because that is a matter between the board and

the trustees, and the individual directors and assistant directors. We do not

have that information at our offices. We would have to go to the boards to get

it.

MR. MANNING: Can you get it?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hatcher.

MR. HATCHER: When the new boards were set up, if you look at individual

positions directors and assistant director positions were classified using the

HAY classification system. The scale that was approved by the

Lieutenant-Governor in Council as required by the act was an HAY classification

system, the executive compensation plan of government. Boards were advised of

that amount. So different director positions, because of the size of boards and

responsibilities, were likely classified at different rates.

For instance, the Director of Avalon East would be classified higher than the

Director of the Labrador School Board for District 2. The scales were sent out

and the instructions were given by the minister of the day to the boards that

these positions were to be paid in accordance with the executive compensation

plan. As the minister just indicated, we understand that some boards have

exceeded that. Government will pay up to the amount approved by the executive

compensation plan and Lieutenant-Governor in Council. If boards choose to pay

their director and assistant director more than that, then it would come from

the operating grants of boards. It would come from other monies.

If you look at the other positions at the board office, like program

specialists, they are teaching positions classified as program specialists. They

are paid in accordance with the NLTA collective agreement, and that is not

exceeded in any case that we know. If the board adds additional program

specialists, then the teaching salary portion of that amount will be paid for

from teaching services. So, if somebody came in with a teaching certificate

seven and was put in an extra program - specialist position - government would

pay the certificate seven. The bonus part that the board must pay for those

program specialists, under the terms of the collective agreement, would have to

come from the operating grants.

If a board put a new position in which was never contemplated, I guess, at

the time, such as an associate assistant director - and a number of boards have

done that. What they have done is taken teaching positions and put them in as

associate assistant directors. Government would pick up the teaching part, the

teacher's salary that is required, because it is a teaching unit. If the board

chooses to pay a bonus to that person, which undoubtedly they would, that would

come from operating. I do not know if that further answers your question.

MR. MANNING: It certainly gets further into it. It makes it more

interesting, the fact that this operating grant which is prescribed to the

school board each year to operate the schools in the district, basically. While

you say government pays - for example, a director, an assistant director and

associate assistant director, the pay scale that is laid out there is paid by

government and then a bonus is paid by the operating grant. It is still paid by

government, at the end of the day. The taxpayers of the Province are still

paying for it one way or the other.

My problem or my issue with that is that there does not seem to be control on

the bonuses. There does not seem to be - I will use directors as an example,

there are ten directors, does every director receive an extra $10,000 bonus? No,

one could get five; one could get thirty. Realizing the size of school boards

and the size of the population of the schools taken into consideration. It would

be very interesting to know what the bonuses are based on the school boards. I

would like to know if the information is available and can be brought to us of

the salaries of these people who are prescribed, such as directors and assistant

directors, and any bonuses that they receive on top of the prescribed salaries

that were laid down by council?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: Just one final point on that. It is quite possible for us to

give you the salaries that we pay under the teacher's payroll system or from

the administration grant for the assistant directors of finance and

administration. I do not believe any of our directors are paid bonuses. They may

be paid different rates within the salary scale, but in order for us to obtain

that we would have to go to the records at the district office level and examine

any T4s and so on that may have been issued for these specifics. We would have

to get that back to you, but we do not have that information at the department.

It is something that can be obtained but is must be obtained from the boards.

MR. MANNING: I would like to obtain it, if possible, Mr. Young. I would

like to go back to do a few things. Is my ten minutes up now?

MADAM CHAIR: I thought what we would do in this session is let everyone

finish up their line of questioning so we could be done around noon if possible.

MR. MANNING: I will defer. I am not finished yet but I don't want to -

MADAM CHAIR: Okay.

Mr. Wiseman.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: I do not want to come out of turn, but I do not lose

the continuity of this particular point. If I could, with the permission of my

colleague, just to pose one question. I will ask the minister because it is in

response to a comment by his Assistant Deputy, Mr. Young.

I am having some difficulty reconciling the different comments. Firstly, I

understand that Mr. Young indicated the information is not readily available to

the department. I also understand from Mr. Hatcher's comments that each of

those boards had to submit to the department for the minister's approval every

single employment contract. So, I am assuming that any kinds of issues with

respect to compensation are dealt with in the contract, whether it includes

bonuses, salaries, education leave, vehicles, anything like that. The director

would be - I give them credit for being half bright - that if any director is

entering into an employment contract that employment contract would spell out

every specific detail, including the salary scale, bonusing, additional leave,

compensation, addition travel, accommodations, or vehicles that might be, all

would be in that employment contract.

That being said - now that is the assumption on my part, based on what I

understand to be the issues dealt with in employment contracts - and I am

assuming Mr. Hatcher's comments about employment contracts being signed off by

the minister, that the minister in signing off the ten or eleven employment

contracts that exist in the Province today, would have retained a copy of that

employment contract for the department's records.

I guess to Mr. Manning's question, is it possible that if the information

he has asked for is included in the employment contracts, could the department

furnish us today with the copies of the employment contracts with each director

in this Province and indicate, to the best of your knowledge, that it is all

encompassing and it covers off every single cent being paid out and all benefits

being paid out to each director?

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: We have never approved an employment contract that was above

that which was laid down by the Order-in-Council.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: I gather from your answer - and you were careful in how

you phrased the comment. Am I to assume from your comment that you have never

approved a contract that was above the Order-in-Council, therefore there are

employment contracts out there that the minister has not approved?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hatcher.

MR. HATCHER: To my knowledge there are no contracts out there that have

not been approved. Generally speaking, in the employment contracts there is a

line which says the level of salary and benefits shall be in accordance with the

scales approved by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. No minister, that I am

aware of, has ever signed an employment contract that exceeds the approved

scales. Now, you referenced car allowances. There is no employment contract that

has car allowances in it. As a matter of fact, at consolidation there was a

directive that went out from the minister of the day telling boards they could

not provide vehicles to senior executive staff.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Wiseman.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: I am going to be very direct with the question then.

Does the department today, or has the department in recent days, recent weeks,

prepared an analysis of directors' compensation in this Province and submitted

to Treasury Board some recommendations for how you are going to reconcile and

streamline the differences that currently exist in directors salaries?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: All of the directors of education across the Province

themselves came together as a collectivity of directors and assistant directors.

We have put together revised position descriptions for all of them right across

the Province. They approached the department to have those position descriptions

analyzed and reclassified, if that was the intent, and made up, based on the

composition of their position descriptions, if in fact it warranted some

adjustment to their salary scales.

From the department's perspective, we have simply resubmitted those to

Treasury Board for evaluation and analysis. We have no word back on those, but

those are re-submission of job descriptions for classifications of the directors

and assistant directors. It is not related to any compensation issue such as

bonuses, or whatever, it is simply to put on the record changes that have

occurred to position descriptions and so on, and whether or not a

reclassification is warranted. So these are reclassification positions only.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: During that process of submitting that and submitting

the new position descriptions, can you confirm for us now that the department

recognized that there are some directors in the Province today who are getting

paid salaries that are different than the executive pay plan would dictate they

would? Let me rephrase: The salary is one piece, being (inaudible) salary, and

the second piece being, receiving benefits well in excess of what people on the

executive pay plan within government would ordinarily get.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Young.

MR. YOUNG: First of all, let me go back to about 1998, I think it was,

when the Auditor General prepared a report related to executive compensation for

some of the directors, well the old superintendents and assistant

superintendents of education at consolidation. There was some discussion at that

point in time about persons receiving benefits in excess of those laid down by

Executive Council. We, at the department level, followed up on that and did make

the necessary changes to the compensation from the department's perspective.

I think you are right, I think there are directors and assistant directors

that the department is aware of who may be receiving benefits in excess of what

we have allocated to them. We have pretty much said that that is a decision of

the individual school boards, it is not a decision of the Department of

Education. We have tried to correct it entirely on all new contracts, as Mr.

Hatcher has said. We have stipulated that they must stick to the compensation

package. If they don't stick to the compensation package, we have no knowledge

of that. Sometimes there are suspicions that are put out but we have no

knowledge of it. We have not done an audit, for example, of the payroll of the

district offices to ascertain whether or not they are being paid in excess of.

The suspicion that we have is that most of them are, in fact, paid exactly as

the should be paid in accordance with the executive pay plan, but we have not

done an audit to make a determination as to whether or not any of them are paid

in excess of that.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Back to my colleague. Thank you for the opportunity to

pose those questions.

MR. HEDDERSON: Just to carry on in that light with a couple of things

that are coming to me. I just ask the minister: Basically, I know that, first of

all, with regard to the director's contracts and so on, I assume they are all

on the same - they came up for renewal, I believe, last year. Last year, I

believe, was the fifth year? They are in place for another five years. I know

when it all came about, I found out in going through it that in actual fact in a

number of boards you almost had assistant directors getting a higher pay than

directors. Would that be - that is not accurate?

MR. YOUNG: Certainly not that we are aware of because the inversion

principle is addressing classification and so on. So, no, there are no assistant

directors paid higher than Directors of Education at the board level.

MR. HEDDERSON: None whatsoever?

MR. YOUNG: Not to our knowledge, entirely.

WITNESS: In the same board.

MR. YOUNG: Oh, in the same board, yes. You may have an assistant director

in St. John's that is paid higher than the Director of Education in Labrador

or in a smaller board. That may very well be the case, but not within the same

board.

MR. HEDDERSON: Within the same board throughout the Province then, the

directors are getting more with regard to compensation than any of the assistant

directors?

MR. YOUNG: That is correct within their own board. That is correct.

MR. HEDDERSON: I will just go on with my line of questioning. I will just

go back over some of the things.

Again, it just seems that a lot of the information is not coming through. I

was surprised to hear the deputy minister indicate that the staff records have

not been done in three years. I just want to question with regard to that

because I know they were pretty elaborate. They were done every September and, I

guess, it was used for planning for the following year. These staff records,

first of all at the school level, why were they discontinued? Was it because you

were revamping them or finances?

MR. GALWAY: Mr. Hedderson, actually, in fact, if we trace back I do not

believe the staff records were ever done every year. I do not know the exact

rotation but as I recall, certainly since I have been associated with the

department, we have not done the staff record every year. We have now made a

deliberate decision to administer the staff record every three years. There has,

in fact, been a different approach taken this year. We are using a Web-based

format so that all teachers would log on to the Web and complete the information

on the Web. I have to tell you, that has been a bit of a challenge this year for

us. Some teachers have been resisting moving to that format. I think it will be

good in the long run because when we go and do the staff records now, the next

time we do it, we will be able to access the record and just make any changes to

the record that may have occurred over the ensuing year since the last time it

was done.

So there has been a different approach. We are trying to do it on the Web.

That will avoid data entry which theoretically should be able to get the

information more readily and it should be accessible with fewer errors in data

entry and that kind of thing. So, yes, there has been a change and the decision

is that we will do it every year because it is somewhat of an onerous task for

teachers to complete that long form.

MR. HEDDERSON: I am a bit surprised because I know it was a pain every

September going around and getting them all, those long sheets and so on. We

used to threaten and say: You wouldn't get paid and that kind of thing. Even

that did not work sometimes, but just the history of it, Gerald. Just to think,

it has not been done in three years?

MR. PRESS: Are you referring now to the annual general return which is

done in September?

MR. HEDDERSON: No, every September we used to go through the whole list

of things: what we were teaching; how many hours; and so on and so forth.

MR. PRESS: The only thing I am aware of that was on a regular basis goes

back probably in the 1980s when Stats Canada had a form that it discontinued,

probably in the mid-1980s, which was an individual teacher-based form that they

did and preprinted and sent out, and teachers updated it. That has not been done

since - I am pretty sure - well into the mid-1980s. We had done it and recognize

that it takes a fair bit of work on the part of each teacher, and there is a

significant cost. That is one of the reasons why Stats Canada withdrew itself

from it. We felt the need to collect information through the transition from one

year to the next, about class sizes and so on, but it was never done on an

annual basis that I can recall.

MR. HEDDERSON: Again, it gave important information and it showed up in

our stats book every year. How many teachers are teaching a particular class, or

how many classes are in this class size, and all this information. I think it is

quite important. Just on staff records because, obviously, you are going to do

the teachers. Are the board offices being done as well?

MR. PRESS: The staff record is -

MR. HEDDERSON: I am just looking at Gerald up there, too. You are saying

that this is going into the schools and every teacher is going to do it.

Correct? Is it every teaching position, which would include the boards

obviously? Our 6,000 teachers will all fill these out, wherever they are

working.

MR. GALWAY: The education staff record is expected to be done by every

school based educator in the system. That would be anyone who would have any

responsibilities at the school level.

MR. HEDDERSON: Again, what you are saying is that this is only going to

be looking at actual teachers who are in the classroom or in the school? It is

going to be school based?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Galway.

MR. GALWAY: That is correct. You will recall, Mr. Hedderson, that the

majority of the information in the educational staff record relates to teaching

assignments, relates to the amount of preparation time, relates to educational

training, experience, the assignment in relation to the training. So the vast

majority of the items on the staff record really are only relevant to teachers

who would be in classroom settings or in school based settings.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: My understanding, if you are going to audit the system you

are looking at where teachers are - and this goes back to my colleagues

questions earlier. We have 6,000 teachers out there. We are supposedly

establishing a good teacher-pupil relation. You are telling us that the

department does not know where the teachers are. Wouldn't this be a way of

making sure - and if you are revamping, it has not been done in a couple of

years. Don't you think that it would be to your advantage, as a department, to

know where everyone is and what they are doing?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Galway.

MR. GALWAY: Certainly, we will take that advice under advisement and look

at in future administrations addressing the units that are in the school board

office.

To repeat myself, most of the information really on the staff record relates

to teaching assignments and that kind of thing. I guess it would be useful for

us to survey the people working in school board offices. Most, again, would be -

program coordinators would not have any direct teaching responsibilities as such

but from the perspective of looking at their qualifications, it may well be

something worth considering in the future.

MADAM CHAIR: Who would like to be next in the line of questioning? Are

you finished, Mr. Hedderson?

MR. HEDDERSON: Am I finished? No, not by any means.

MADAM CHAIR: Oh, I am sorry. Carry on.

MR. HEDDERSON: Thank you very much.

Just to say on that theme, if I could, Minister - allocations. We know a

couple of years ago the allocation formulas were changed. We have small, medium

and large schools. I was just listening to the exchange between two of my

colleagues on teacher allocations. Again, I get the feeling it is the board that

determines the number of teachers who go into a particular school. Now I would

assume that if the allocation formula is put into play that you would not

accept, as a department, anything less than that. Am I correct in saying that

the board literally could go below the level of what should be allocated and you

cannot do anything about it? Would that be a fair statement?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Press.

MR. PRESS: I am not sure if I would word it completely in that direction,

what we would do about it. We tend to come at it from the school board's

perspective, and that is, if we are going to be so prescriptive as to have a

formula - and I am not judging the formula. This was done by a couple of

prominent educators a couple of years ago - to prescribe what must go on within

each school, then the boards would say to you: Well, first of all, you are

taking away any flexibility that we would have to do other kinds of things,

whether it is right or whether it is wrong, to offer AP, Russian or Spanish in

the school, or music in the school, closer to home or whatever. The boards would

say: Well, if you are going to be that prescriptive why do you need us? Then you

have to ask the fundamental question: Do we want duly elected school boards in

order to make the kinds of educational and pedagogical decisions around what

kinds of programs, and so on, or services are offered within individual schools?

It may come down to: Well, we want to offer a local program or we want to

offer a local course, and so on. Boards would say: Well, we would like to have

that flexibility to be able to do that. We want them to be used in a block. In

fact, we have asked this question on a number of occasions to our school boards

and so on: Do you want it to be more prescriptive? In other words, do you want

certain allocations to be very much detailed and boards to fit within those

allocations on a school-by-school or even a program-by-program basis? The school

boards will tell us, and have told us on every occasion, that: no, we want them

as a block. We want to be able to make local decisions and to add programs or

expand programs in certain areas and so on. So, it really boils down to a

fundamental decision about, you know, where do we want the local decision-making

to take place? Do we want it to be in the local area or the local region, or do

we want the Province to make those kinds of decisions on a school-by-school

basis?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Again, just looking at it, let's take it from this tact, that, obviously,

the allocation formulas are applied to every school in the Province in

allocating teachers?

MR. PRESS: Yes, the formula is used as a method of really defining how

many resources we need for a Province, and broken down for a school board. It

was never intended that it be used as a mechanism to allocate by school. It was

used as a means by which to determine the number of resources. Here is a block,

then the board has that block, and it is up to the board then to decide how it

wants to manage that block.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: So we could take any school board, for example - and say

there are fifty schools there - the board comes in and says: Look, according to

the allocation formulas and what we have done and the needs that we have, we

need 100 teachers. So, when you look at that number, my question is that with

all the school boards in this Province and the number of teachers now who are in

there, is it just purely based on the allocation formulas for every individual

school combined? How far along are you, as a department, in going over and

beyond that allocation? Is it spot on, or do we now have fifty more teachers,

100 more teachers than is allocated by the formulas?

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: We have 218 more than the formula would say we needed.

MR. HEDDERSON: So, there are 218 teachers now that are over and beyond

what is required. Out of those 218 teachers, how many goes to Avalon West? How

many goes to Avalon East? What is the determination there?

MR. REID: It would have been based on the formula from whence they came,

I would assume. It is prorated according to what the student population would

have been. For example, if, according to the formula, you were supposed to take

out twenty teachers - if you eliminated the 378. Well, because we are only

taking out a percentage of those teachers rather than the whole 378, we would

take out a percentage of the number in each board. Do you get where I am coming

from?

MR. HEDDERSON: Yes, it is based on numbers then. So, the 218 teachers,

you do some type of a formula to decide how many goes to Avalon East, how many

goes to Avalon West and so on and so forth.

MR. REID: That is right.

MR. HEDDERSON: So it is just based on what could have been and what you

have done and so on, but you make the decision on that?

MR. REID: Yes.

MR. HEDDERSON: Okay.

The allocation formulas; one of the biggest problems with the allocation

formulas as it came in a couple of years ago is that it put at a disadvantage

our larger schools, especially our large urban areas whereby the smaller schools

seem to have gotten - that problem was addressed. The mid-size schools, but I

have had complaints galore. Just about every large school that I go into, they

talk about - initially they got hit probably - and I am talking about larger

schools, probably 500-plus for sure, 600, 700, 800, the larger schools. They

have indicated both at the elementary, junior high and high school level, in

particular, that they got done in probably four or five units. That has followed

them through right up until this present day.

Right on the heels of the Budget Brian Shortall indicated that he was going

to have great difficulties in addressing the large class sizes in the larger

schools. Has there been any thought in your prorating - do you take that into

account and look at boards that are particularly hard hit with these larger

schools to try and compensate for that inequity in the allocation formulas?

MR. REID: Obviously, Tom, we have to put teachers in smaller schools;

smaller populations.

MR. HEDDERSON: Oh, absolutely, I never said that.

MR. REID: That is going to somehow have it such that in larger schools

the class size might be somewhat larger; but, having said that, you are still

left with a situation whereby the larger the school the more programs you can

offer.

MR. HEDDERSON: Not necessarily. We thought that, but that is not

necessarily true.

MR. REID: It certainly appears to be true, and I would say that it is

true, because in St. John's right now they are offering Russian, Spanish and I

think even an aquaculture course in one of the schools. We are certainly not

afforded that opportunity on Change Islands or Fogo Island or even in parts of

your own district.

I don't place an emphasis on Russian or Spanish, but having done a masters

in linguistics, I think we should be offering as many language courses as we

possibly can. It would be great for my sons and your kids to be able to speak

four or five different languages, but sometimes we have to make choices, and the

same holds through for boards.

I know that you continue to talk about large classes, and there are large

classes in some schools, but then again that is a decision, to some degree, that

the board and the particular school makes. You are talking about urban areas,

and it is the same across the country. In urban areas the class sizes are

usually larger, but we still have the best student-teacher ratio in our urban

centers than anywhere in the country. In fact, the ratio in Avalon East, which

is the largest urban area in our Province, is fifteen point six to one, which

doesn't appear on paper to be very large. I allow there are going to be large

classes in that, but we discussed that earlier, why there would be large classes

and why there would be small classes.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: There are all kinds of examples one way or the other and I

don't want to get into that, but I do want to get into the difficulty that

large schools - I must qualify, as well, that it is not necessarily large urban

schools, I just used that as an example. I consider my area a rural area.

Ascention Collegiate serves my area; Blaketown, Crescent Collegiate, and

Amalgamated Academy down in Bay Roberts on the junior high level. So, these are

not considered to be urban schools, but they find themselves placed at a

disadvantage because they are large. They are not getting the same type of

teacher allocation for their programing as some of the mid-size or smaller

schools. There is a gap there.

I thought that by looking at the 218 teachers - I guess the point I am trying

to get across is: Can we, somehow or another, address that through the extra

teachers that you have allocated in there? Is there any way that we can address

it?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Reid.

MR. REID: We left the additional 218 in. We have asked the school boards

to come forward to us with proposals as to how they would see those teachers

deployed, and we are waiting to hear what they have to say on that issue.

Having said all that - and I know there are large classes in some areas of

the Province - we are still doing better as a Province than any other province

in Canada with regard to teacher allocations.

I know, having been a teacher myself, that is sometimes in dispute, but we

are comparing apples with apples and oranges with oranges across this country

and we still have the best student-teacher ratio in the country and it is

continuing to get better. If we have large classes in urban areas in

Newfoundland and Labrador, then, boy, they must have some awfully large classes

in places like Ontario.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: Again, I do not want to get into the discussion or,

indeed, the argument, but to make a point, I think we all realize that the

numbers game is a thing of the past. What we have to look at, given the

geography, given the spread of the student population in this Province, so on

and so forth, are the programing needs rather than numbers, and that is where it

is coming in. I am sitting back and very hopeful that distance education, or

some of the other strategies that we may use to address that - the days of just

looking at numbers and dividing the number of students by the number of teachers

is not going to adequately address the needs, and programing needs especially,

of this particular Province.

Minister, I will stop there, because I am going on another train of thought,

and just reserve the right to come back. I would just like to pass along to

other members.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: I want to comment on the programing needs. We are aware of the

programing needs, especially in our rural small schools, and that is the reason

we have allocated more teachers in those smaller schools than we have to the

larger ones. As I said earlier, in the larger, more urban schools they have far

more programs than those in the rural schools.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: I saying, minister, do not assume that, please, do not

assume that. That is not necessarily true, and I can vouch for it.

MADAM CHAIR: Could we move on, please?

MR. REID: No, I want to comment on that.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: If you look at the Avalon East School Board, you cannot tell me

that the high schools in the Avalon East School Board are offering fewer

programs than any of the schools in rural Newfoundland or Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Mr. Hedderson.

MR. HEDDERSON: Just one last comment on it. Like I said, I, basically,

was involved in a school of 300 or less for twenty years. In that programing in

the high school, mostly what I was involved in, we offered three sciences. I am

just using that as one example in the small school setting. We sacrificed some

things for it, as you have mentioned, if you are doing an AP program. Every

student who wanted to went through the three sciences and came out. To my mind,

that was very, very important, especially in their choices as they went into

post-secondary. So, they got their chemistry, they got their physics and they

have their biology.

With the reorganization and into a larger school, which Bishop O'Neill gave

way to Ascension Collegiate, at Ascension Collegiate it was impossible for my

daughter, when she went down there - my first daughter went through with the

smaller school, three sciences. My second daughter went through, but the

scheduling did not allow for her to go through the three sciences. It was not

set up. The only thing that I had her do to make sure she got the three sciences

was to challenge the third level physics because there was no prerequisite for

it.

What I am saying, minister, is that, you know, you cannot naturally assume

that just because you have a large school, that you can offer the same programs

even of a small school, because of the makeup of the student population and so

on and so forth. In that case, I can tell you, the programming of the smaller

school overall was more of a choice of the students.

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: But you already said that when you were the principal of your

particular school you offered three sciences and you had to sacrifice some other

courses. Maybe that is what they are doing at Ascension. Maybe they are

sacrificing a science and in turn picking up a different course. So it is more

based on the prerogative of the administration in a particular school in what

emphasis they place on a particular subject. To say that larger schools cannot

offer the same programs as your school, it is just that they pick the courses

they want to offer. Maybe they put more emphasis on music or phys. ed. at

Ascension than you did, and therefore they do not have the three sciences.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Press.

MR. PRESS: He is absolutely right.

All I was going to suggest is, the issue of your daughter may be one of

scheduling more so than an adequacy of the number of allocations which are in

the schools. I mean, what we have as a province to look at is, get an allocation

system that is as fair and as equitable as it can be. What it does is makes a

"minor" - I say it in quotes - a "minor" adjustment for

rural schools, who recognize that it is much more difficult in a very small

school in Grey River to offer the kind of programming that one could offer in

Blaketown or in St. John's.

We can get, if you wish, a printout of the number of courses that are

offered, broken down by high school, right across the Province, and it will show

you that, by and large, larger schools have much more diverse programming

offered in their schools than smaller schools do. That is just the nature of the

number of teachers that you would have in that school and the flexibility, the

qualifications that they would have, and the kind of opportunities that you

would have in a larger school with many more teacher resources there than you

would in a smaller school.

MADAM CHAIR: Thank you.

Mr. Ottenheimer.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I have a few questions that perhaps relate directly to, I guess, the federal

government's role in education. I guess it is fair to say that the more this

Province, or indeed any province, can call upon the federal government to assist

by way of grant or contribution to the Province to assist in its educational

expenses, the better off we are as a Province in terms of, presumably, savings

for our provincial Treasury.

I would like to refer specifically to Native's Peoples' Education under

the heading 2.1.03., where it indicates that the costs of the operation of

schools in designated native communities are recoverable from the federal

government. Although the amount is not large, we do see that federal

contributions are slightly less than the overall allocated amount.

I am just wondering: Why should there be any deficiency, or why should there

be any difference, in amounts that presumably would have to be paid by the

provincial department when we consider this area as being one that is funded by

the federal government?

MADAM CHAIR: Minister Reid.

MR. REID: We just signed an agreement with the federal government not to

take over. Obviously, under the Land Claims Agreement in Labrador, they are

going to run their own schools eventually. We just signed an agreement with the

federal government that we will continue to administer those schools on their

behalf up until the aboriginal people in Labrador want to take them over

themselves. So I think it is on a cost recovery basis, isn't it Bob - total?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hatcher.

MR. HATCHER: The minister is referring to the school in Natuashish. The

federal government agreed to take over 100 per cent of the cost of delivering

programs to the students who attend that particular school, and the full

operating cost. An agreement was just signed recently with respect to that

particular school in anticipation of a reserve being created under the Indian

act at Natuashish.

The reference you make to 2.1.03., that is a federal-provincial cost shared

agreement which provides additional funding to schools in five designated Inuit

communities, Nain, Hopedale, Rigolet, Postville and Makkovik. The agreement has

been in place for many years. Each year the federal contribution usually

increases by the CPI.

These monies are expected to be used to provide aboriginal specific

curriculum over and above the programming that is provided for by the Province.

In these particular communities, the provincial programs are offered and paid

for by the Province the same as they are in other schools in the Province. The

additional federal funds are used to make other programs available through

curriculum development, also a variety made up of teacher assistants and so on.

These particular funds here, even though there is $2.1 million this year and

it looks like $2.0 is forecasted for next year, that is an anticipated federal

revenue. In the past, the history has been that it is always (inaudible) up by

the CPI.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Ottenheimer.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Is it restricted just to the Inuit communities?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hatcher.

MR. HATCHER: This particular funding is, yes. This particular funding

comes from a federal-provincial cost shared agreement for native people in Inuit

communities. The agreement is beyond education. It is also provincial community

infrastructure as well. This is the educational portion of that agreement.

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Ottenheimer.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Madam Chair.

What is the arrangement with respect to our Innu communities in Labrador? I

am thinking specifically of Sheshatshu and Davis Inlet, for example. Is there a

similar arrangement or is it restricted just to the Inuit communities that you

have identified?

MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Hatcher.

MR. HATCHER: There was an agreement. There were two agreements in the

past. One for Inuit communities and one for the two Innu communities. Several

years ago the federal government agreed to a request from the Band Councils in

Davis Inlet and Sheshatshiu that the Inuit agreement would - funding would be

provided for equipment, and funding would be provided to the Band Councils.

There is no longer a federal-provincial cost-shared agreement for that.

In Davis Inlet before the February move and in Sheshatshiu now, the Province

pays the same level of funding as it would to other communities in the Province.

The Innu Band Councils are receiving contributions from the federal government

for education to allow extra programming there. The Davis Inlet school is closed

as of February. As the minister referred to a few minutes ago, the new school in

Natuashish, in the new community in Sango Bay, is now being paid 100 per cent

from federal funds.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: If Davis is closed and Sango Bay is under a new formula,

and if the Inuit communities are covered under this arrangement, that would

leave, I guess, Sheshatshiu perhaps as - am I correct in saying that would leave

just Sheshatshiu as a native community in our Province without the contribution

of federal funding?

MR. HATCHER: No, the federal government is still providing funding to the

Band Council of Sheshatshiu for supplementary education. The federal government,

two years ago, built an extension on the existing school. The Province, the

federal government, and the Innu are currently in land claims discussions and

self-government discussions, as you would be aware. At this point in time the

federal government appears willing - they have indicated to the Sheshatshiu that

they are prepared to provide funding for a new school and are prepared to enter

into some form of contribution or accept full cost of payment for schooling in

Sheshatshiu.

Under the Indian Act, when the reserve is created at Sheshatshiu the federal

government will assume all costs for education on the reserve. There is some

indication that the federal government is willing to do the same as it did in

Natuashish, to assume that before the reserve is created, because a reserve date

has not been set yet. These negotiations are ongoing and have not been resolved.

MR. REID: I guess, John, what he is saying is that with regard to Inuit,

Document details

Collection	Newfoundland and Labrador — Committees
Citation	2007-03-04
Type	committee
Volume / chapter	committees_standingcommittees_socialservices_ga44_ss03-04-07-ed.htm
Language	en
Format	html
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	e21f042ed3632c9fba9ab786b46ab6560312ea3d

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