At the latest school board meeting, the district claimed that the teachers’ “teach only” campaign has cost approximately $180,000 because their managers are busy covering supervision. The presentation purposefully omitted the “opportunities gained” for our students as a result of teachers not attending staff meetings or performing supervision duties.
According to the Ministry of Education, in 2010/11 the average Abbotsford teacher salary was $70,278. We are paid for 200 days a year and the federal government credits teachers with 9.1 hours of work per day.
Based on this information, teachers in Abbotsford average $351.39 per day or $38.61 per hour. According to the collective agreement, staff, meetings can last for one hour and 45 minutes, meaning every meeting costs, on average, $67.56 per teacher. Multiplied by 1,000 full-time equivalent (FTE) teachers in Abbotsford, that means every cycle of staff meetings costs about $67,560. Since September, each teacher has missed about 10 staff meetings for a total of $675,600 in “opportunities gained” for our students.
Further, each teacher, when not on job action, performs 25 minutes of supervision per week, which is worth, on average, $16.09. Multiplied by 1,000 FTE teachers, that equals $16,090 per week or $337,870 in “opportunities gained” since September.
To date, the current “teach only” campaign has created $1,013,479 in opportunities for our students. By not attending meetings with administration or performing supervision, teachers have had more time to work collaboratively with colleagues, offer more in-depth feedback to students, lesson plan to meet the needs of all students, and inform their pedagogy through research to name just a few of the ways students have benefitted from the “teach only” campaign underway.
This does not include the vast number of voluntary roles that teachers take on every year, which, if costed, out would surely be worth millions of dollars in “opportunities gained” for students.
If parents have any concerns, we encourage them to speak with their child’s teacher, who will be more than willing to talk with them because Kids Matter and Teachers Care.
Jeff Dunton,
President, Abbotsford District Teachers' Association