To Whom It May Concern,

My name is James Flynn and I am a Nova Scotia public school teacher. I am writing this
letter at a time when the NSTU (Nova Scotia Teacher's Union) has been in a labour
dispute with the Province of Nova Scotia for a number of months.
As background (and full disclosure), I voted against the tentative agreement presented to
teachers in the spring of 2016, voicing a frustration shared by many members of the NSTU
with the public school system. After that, I voted for the tentative agreement offered to the
NSTU (and recommended by our union executive) in the fall of 2016, and against the
subsequent strike vote that occurred when that agreement was rejected by the NSTU
membership. My rationale for this was that many of the issues facing classroom teachers
were issues of policy, and contract negotiations more frequently examine issues of money.
Simply put, I did not believe that the arena of contract negotiations was the appropriate
place to rectify the problems existing in the public school system in Nova Scotia.
Since that time, the NSTU has conflated our labour dispute with an attempt to 'make
schools better for students'. The public has been (overall) very supportive of this notion. A
third tentative agreement has been reached, but I can not, in good conscience, vote in
support of an agreement whose only immediate, tangible effects are small improvements
on the teachers' bottom line.
From the beginning of this dispute, I have felt that there is a sharp divide between the
issues that our negotiators (on both sides) are discussing and the pressing issues that
classroom teachers want to see addressed. Committees that will either take years to report
or that will just throw money out randomly do not speak to the urgent need for change that
teachers are trying to express.
I do not blame either side for this divide. As I mentioned earlier, contract negotiations are
a poor vehicle to address these issues. As well, a lot of the union membership have been
quite content over the years (myself included) to let the union executive do what it does
without seeking to interact with them on matters of substance. The fault lies with all of us
who have not taken part in the discussion, who have not voiced our concerns.
To remedy that, at least personally, I provide the following list of changes that I would like
to see in our system. I believe that many other teachers would like to see these changes as
well, but I would not presume to say that with certainty.
I have broken the list down into three parts... 'Easy' mainly refers to policy changes that
could be enacted immediately, with little or no immediate cost. 'Challenging' refers more to
money matters, and 'Difficult' refers to structural changes. Rationale for each point follows
the list. I understand that some of these issues fall outside of the domain of the NSTU and
DOEECD (Department of Education and Early Childhood Development), but discussions
could certainly include input from other organizations (notably, the school boards).

Easy:
1) Remove the so called 'No Fail' policy.
2) Allow firm deadlines on student work.
3) Allow teachers choice in how to assess the classes they teach... specifically, not
insisting that every teacher follow a '1 - 4 on every individual outcome' format.
4) Allow teachers to make their own comments on report cards, that do not need to
follow a template.
5) Give schools more autonomy in dealing with issues of student discipline.
Challenging:
1) Hire more educational assistants (EAs).
2) Put class size caps in place at all levels:
i) elementary - 15
ii) junior high - 20
iii) senior high - 25
3) Either reduce record keeping requirements or increase preparation time.
4) Develop a meaningful accountability program for schools, where the investigation
responsibility lies outside of the school.
5) Remuneration.
Difficult:
(This section only has one point, and I hope readers will examine the rationale before
dismissing it as inflammatory nonsense.)
1) Replace the school board system with an expanded DOEECD and school trustee
committees.
Rationale
Easy:
1) Remove the so-called 'No Fail' policy.
Without the possibility of failure, success is meaningless. We have done no greater
disservice to the students of this generation than to give them the opportunity to
advance without meeting any expectations. We should use critical years of
development to foster a sense of achievement and a belief that effort can have
reward, but instead we foster a culture of entitlement and a belief that putting forth
an effort is meaningless. Thankfully, the majority of our students naturally see the
error in this thinking, but we allow an increasing number to pass through our
school system with this belief every year.
Aside from the moral imperative, many of our urgent classroom issues can be tied
to the 'No Fail' policy. It has led to widely varying levels of student ability in one
classroom, an increased number of students on IPPs (Individualized Program
Plans), and behavioural issues, just to name a few deleterious effects.

2) Allow firm deadlines on student work.

Allowing students to hand in assigned work whenever they feel like it helps to
reinforce the negative beliefs mentioned in the previous point, as well as leaving
students ill-prepared to enter any post-secondary environment where they will have
expectations of punctuality placed on them. Further, this system places an unfair
burden on teachers, as they not only end up with large and varied piles of marking
at the end of a course, but they are also responsible for constantly reminding
students to hand in work.
3) Allow teachers choice in how to assess the classes they teach... specifically, not insisting
that every teacher follow a '1 - 4 on every individual outcome' format.
The '1 - 4 benchmark format' lends itself well to some classrooms, and poorly to
others. Forcing teachers to communicate with a system they don't agree with leads
to poor communication. Our current assessment storage software allows for
multiple assessment systems. Allowing teachers the freedom to choose the system
that best works for their classes and students will make for more effective
communication.
4) Allow teachers to make their own comments on report cards, that do not need to follow
a template.
As mentioned in the previous point, forcing teachers to communicate in a certain
way undermines the communication. Allowing freedom in communication makes
for better communication.
5) Give schools more autonomy in dealing with issues of student discipline.
Student discipline is an area where the school staff is far more aware of (and
affected by) the issues than school boards or the DOEECD. Currently, the onus is
on schools to provide evidence to school boards when requesting certain
disciplinary measures. This creates an atmosphere where school staff are constantly
being second-guessed by school board officials who are not as aware of the issues at
hand as school staff are. In these matters, schools should be given the authority to
make immediate decisions, which would stand unless successfully appealed to a
higher authority.
Challenging:
1) Hire more educational assistants (EAs).
I have in my class (as most teachers do) certain students. These students are not
students with severe behavioural issues. These are not students with special physical
needs. These are not students substantial developmental challenges.
The students I'm referring to are students who, for a variety of reasons, are unable
to cope with the academic requirements of a classroom. This could be due to a
learning disorder, or simply a by-product of a system that allows students to
advance without meeting grade level expectations (see point 1 under Easy). Either
way, these are students who, without intervention, get nothing out of a regular
classroom.

These are not hopeless students. I can see that if they just had someone to sit with
them and help them read a line, or to express themselves, or to write a sentence, or
simply to help them focus on the task at hand, they could gain something from
being there. To my deep shame, that person is not me. If I were to sit and give
these students the attention they need (and deserve), in that space of time a handful
of other students would wilfully and cheerfully act to disrupt the rest of the class. So
in the interests of the whole I necessarily ignore the needs of the few, and it makes
me sick.
We do not need more planning time to help these students. We do not need a
committee to investigate best practices from here to the international community.
WE NEED MORE EDUCATIONAL ASSISTANTS.
Over the past few years the number of EAs in the school system has been
drastically reduced. A maddening part of this is that EAs, while tremendously
effective, are also ridiculously cheap. Removing one EA from a school has an
almost negligible effect on the bottom line of a budget, but can do irreparable harm
to the development of the students that they help.
I know that this is neither a NSTU or DOEECD issue. EA's are in a different
union and are hired by the school boards. However, DOEECD does control
school board budgets, and it is certainly in DOEECD's capacity to place conditions
on how that money is spent. We are failing these students. Please, I beg you, if you
hear nothing else in this letter, hear that this situation is urgent and that these
students need our help.
2) Put class size caps in place at all levels.
I don't think this needs much explanation. Past a certain number of students,
teachers become less effective. Teachers don't want to be less effective. Students
don't want us to be less effective. Parents don't want us to be less effective. I believe
the cap sizes that I mentioned above, while challenging to support, would be the
most effective. Others may believe differently.
3) Either reduce record keeping requirements or increase preparation time.
Again, fairly self-explanatory. Most would acknowledge that record keeping
demands have increased tremendously over the past decade or so, with little or no
time given to offset the demand. Possible means of reducing record keeping can be
found under point 3 in Easy and point 4 in Challenging. If, instead, the increasing
preparation time option were taken, it would ideally take the form of one less
course per teaching assignment.
4) Develop a meaningful accountability program for schools, where the investigation
responsibility lies outside of the school.
I don't think anyone would deny that schools need to be accountable to the public.
However, the form that this accountability has taken over the recent past is
counterproductive. Personally, I get a bit disgusted when I think of the amount of

time and money that has been wasted in these so-called 'accountability programs'
that made absolutely no one accountable to anyone. We have had more of these
programs in the recent past than I can remember (School Improvement Planning,
Accreditation, Continuous School Improvement, two or three more that I can't
remember and can't be bothered to look up), and all that any of them showed was
that teachers can generate masses of pointless data and paper on demand if we are
forced to.
An independent body should be established to conduct accountability audits of
schools. It would be their responsibility to collect data and evaluate schools on
criteria set by stakeholders in the education system. These auditors would have the
ability to conduct interviews with teachers, students, parents, and the wider school
community in order to collect their data. A reasonable time frame for these audits
would be once every 5 to 10 years. This would give a large amount of time back to
teachers and administrators and students, while keeping schools accountable to the
public (much more so than they are now).
5) Remuneration.
I am not in much of a position to speak to this point. Personally, I would forego
any raise in this contract if the other points mentioned herein were addressed.
However, I am also a single man who is not trying to raise a family, and I cannot
speak to economic pressures the same way that most of my colleagues can. With
that in mind, I will say this. Teachers are, as a rule, compassionate to the pleas that
the province is in a difficult financial position. However, it is difficult to sell teachers
on financial restraint when they see the unconscionable levels of waste that occur,
not only at the DOEECD and school board level, but also in the government as a
whole. I would respectfully offer to the province that if they want teachers to help
carry the load, that they do some of the lifting themselves as well.
Difficult:
1) Replace the school board system with an expanded DOEECD and school trustee
committees.
I want to be clear on this point from the outset; I am not advocating for a
consolidation of all of our school boards into one board. I am advocating for the
disassembly of the school board system.
There are 8 school boards in the province of Nova Scotia. Each one generates its
own policies, hires its own specialists, hires its own staff, has its own bureaucracy
and creates its own waste. There is no need for our province to have 8 (9 if you
include DOEECD) bodies to provide oversight to our school system.
Some would argue that the boards provide local representation to school
governance. I would ask those people to talk to the communities of River John and
Wentworth about how well represented they feel by their school board. The boards
have simply gotten too big to maintain anything but an illusion of local
representation. If each school catchment zone had its own board of trustees, with

money management and hiring responsibilities, you would have far more local
representation.
School boards do provide important school oversight functions, as well as guidance
in developing best practice policies for schools. However, there is no need for this
to be done in 9 different ways across the province. An expanded DOEECD would
be able to provide oversight as well as develop policy. Policy that would, as an
added bonus, be consistent across the province.
As a final point in this, many of the people employed at the school board offices
are qualified teachers. If they are reassigned to the classroom, they could go a long
way towards meeting the needs implied by some of the points mentioned
previously. These are qualified teachers, already being paid as part of our current
budgets. This would be a no cost solution to the need for more teachers (and I
want to stress, I am not suggesting that these teachers replace people in current
positions, but rather, new teaching positions be created that they would fill).
In closing, I fully expect that this will end up in people's junk mail folders, or in an ignored
post on some social media platform. If someone in a position of power does happen to
read it, I'm sure it will be written off as ignorant idealism from someone who doesn't see
the big picture... and they wouldn't be wrong. I don't see the big picture. I see the students
that we are letting down, day after day. The students that our system fails, and those who
succeed despite our system, not because of it.
I am putting this out in the world only because I feel the need to say something. Even if it is
ignored, even if it is too late, I can at least tell myself that I tried to speak.
If you have read this far and found anything helpful, I am glad. Please feel free to pass this
along to others if you so choose. I would only ask that you do not change any of the
contents, or take pieces out of context.

Sincerely,
James Flynn
B.Sc., M.Sc., B.Ed., M.Ed.