Canadian Teacher Discipline

Decisions amount to "a backroom deal -- a handshake. The discipline process has degenerated into a non-discipline process." - a former B.C. College of Teachers council member

Nov 13, 2007 - Cathy Abraham, who was on the college's governing council in 2003-04 by government appointment, on the decision not to discipline teachers.

"They're not disciplining them and therefore they don't have to publish their names on the registry," said Cathy Abraham, who was on the college's governing council in 2003-04 by government appointment.

Carl Ratsoy, a teacher who served on council as an elected member and later as a government appointee until 2004, said the decisions amount to "a backroom deal -- a handshake. The discipline process has degenerated into a non-discipline process."

And here is how the cases are decided.

While declining to comment on individual cases, [College spokesman Richard] Walker said the three-person committee that adjudicates almost every case that lands before the college makes decisions in the best interests of students.

The members this year are two retired teacher-union leaders, Jim Gill and John Grain, and lawyer Tim Dunford, who represents parents.

That committee handles most discipline through "consent resolution agreements." If those agreements include a reprimand, a suspension or a certificate cancellation, they are considered discipline. Of 29 agreements signed in recent years, 18 did not include discipline.

The college does not release details of those agreements and they are not obtainable through freedom-of-information legislation. In some cases, the agreement specifies what details may be made public.

TT - This is how educators protect students in Canada. What kind of idiots would allow cases to be examined union leaders who outnumber the parent representative?

The sad thing is that there is little difference in how the educational establishment protects teachers in the U.S. With closed door hearings, negotiated agreements that are confidential and even private agreement on what details will be available to public scrutiny.