Dear Parents / Guardians,
It is important to acknowledge the significant disruption this job action is causing for everyone – our students, parents/guardians, staff and the community. Our goal continues to be finding a solution that is fair to our employees and that gets us back into our schools as quickly as possible.
The intent of this letter is to discuss the potential implications for your child’s education for the remainder of the school year. While the duration of the strike remains undetermined at this time, there is some information that I can share to help alleviate some of the concerns you may have:
- Students will not be prevented from moving to the next grade level or graduating because of the strike;
- Once we return from the strike our priority will be on maximizing instructional time while still honouring specific school-based events that are core to a school’s culture or operations (e.g. secondary school graduation activities, elementary track day in June);
- As with other previous workplace disruptions (e.g. snow days, power outages, previous strikes) various accommodations will be considered to teaching and assessment plans:
- Focussing on core curricular objectives;
- Minimizing or eliminating activities such as optional field trips;
- Adjusting term dates;
- Adjusting informal reporting including parent-teacher interviews;
- Adjusting semester dates;
- Adjusting report card timelines.
- Students in Grade 12 will not lose their graduation year or any necessary credits towards post-secondary applications;
- As post-secondary Institutions rely primarily on final marks when admitting students into programs our students will receive final marks for all of their courses;
- Secondary schools will be distributing updates to parent communities regarding assessments, secondary school transcripts, post-secondary information sessions, and any key dates for post-secondary application deadlines;
- Changes to the total number of instructional days, length of the school days, or altering established school breaks, will likely not occur due to contractual language obligations and parent/family time commitments.
We look forward to re-engaging with your children and providing them with the outstanding learning opportunities that Saanich Schools are known for when we return to our classrooms.
Respectfully,
Dave Eberwein
Superintendent of Schools