Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last week the Northwest Territories Teachers’ Association released a pan-northern study on teacher workload, entitled “Understanding Teacher Workloads.”
It is significant to me that the findings from this study are consistent with national and international research. In fact, across many sectors in North America, overwork is a growing problem marked by work intensification. This report’s findings show that although NWT teachers love their jobs and their students, they are burning themselves out, trying to deliver a quality product within a system that is not supporting their efforts.
Northern teachers are consistently being asked to do more and more with less and less. We must ever be mindful that teachers’ work environments are our children’s learning environments. If working conditions are putting our teachers at risk of burnout and stress, this has a negative effect on the quality of NWT children’s education.
The report finds that NWT teachers are struggling with increasing demands and fewer resources. These demands include such things as:
diverse needs and academic abilities amongst the children in any classroom;
student absenteeism;
lack of clerical support and classroom assistants;
lack of time for planning and professional collaboration;
a perpetual cycle of new teachers leaving the communities and/or the profession due to stress or isolation; and
stress from non-instructional issues.
This report also includes recommendations for positive change, including such things as:
creating flexible curriculums supported by capacity and time to do things;
building time into the teacher’s day for professional collaboration;
support for unworkable systems, multiple grades, ability levels and increasing students’ needs in the classrooms;
recognition and support for workloads, which include increased reporting, changing curriculums, evolving assessment requirements and societal demands;
supporting teachers in classrooms with adequate numbers of EAs and coordination with other community supports, social services, health care and so on.
I applaud the NWTTA for their initiative in doing this study and sharing the findings with all education stakeholders. I sincerely hope that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment will seriously consider the report and its findings as it moves ahead with their Education Renewal and Innovation Initiative and that the Minister will continue to work with the NWTTA to make things better for all our NWT teachers. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
