Waterloo region's Catholic school board issues 'surplus' notices to teachers

The Waterloo Catholic District School Board has issued "surplus notices" to teachers this week, although the exact number is not being revealed.

John Shewchuk, chief managing officer for the school board, said the surplus notices are different than layoff notices, like the ones Upper Grand District School Board issued to 54 elementary teachers last week.

"It's really important to stress that any notices received by staff in the next couple weeks are known as 'surplus' notices Any necessary 'layoff' notices wouldn't be issued until the end of May," Shewchuk told CBC in an email.

"It would be inappropriate to comment on numbers of surplus notices until all the affected staff have all been personally notified."

Notice time

Shewchuk says under the collective agreements, the board has to give a certain amount of notice to staff if their current position at their current location may no longer exist in the next school year. Those members receive a surplus notice. Some staff at elementary schools received those notices on Tuesday.

He said knowing there are some surplus teachers in areas means there could be an opportunity to move them elsewhere within the board.

Alana Russell, chief communications officer with the Waterloo Region District School Board, said they have "not issued any layoffs at this time" and they are "not expecting any for elementary at this time."

Grant money,class size uncertainty

Shewchuk says the Catholic board will now wait to get confirmation from the provincial government on final funding amounts for the 2019-20 school year before moving forward.

He said there are at least two factors at play for the next school year that the board needs to know before moving forward.

One is grant money. The province is eliminating a significant grant, called the local priorities fund. For the local Catholic board, that'sabout $2.7 million. There are 73 staff members either fully or partially funded through that grant.

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As well, there is uncertainty around other grants, including one called "education programming other." There are currently 15 staff members fully or partly funded from these grants, but there's currently no information from the ministry about theirfuture.

The second factor is the potential increase to class sizes in both elementary and secondary schools, which will mean theboard would use fewer teachers.

"Our internal estimates indicate that if we had to move to [a student-teacher radio of] 28:1 for September 2019, we would employ 80 fewer teachers," Shewchuk said.

"The government has messaged that no staff will lose their jobs as a result of the change in the secondary pupil to teacher ratio, so we sincerely hope that scenario does indeed come to pass."

Shewchuk said it's hoped with retirements and people leaving the job ofteaching, along with enrolment growth, they can "mitigate against" any layoffs.