The school district has announced that recess will be cancelled as a result of the first stage of the BCTF job action:
Recess was also cancelled by the administration, as a result of the 2011 job action: https://sd57dpac.ca/2011/08/recess-update/
Recess is not cancelled in all of BC:
Recess will be cancelled in several school districts across B.C. as the province’s 41,000 public-school teachers begin job action on Wednesday.
The districts that have cancelled recess include:
- Prince George
- Quesnel.
- Terrace.
- Prince Rupert.
- North Okanagan/Shuswap.
- Bulkley Valley.
Northern Vancouver Island School District had considered cancelling recess, but reconsidered and decided not to cancel it.
BC Teachers’ Federation president Jim Iker said six school districts have plans to cancel recess tomorrow when the phase-one action begins.
“We don’t think that’s fair to the students, that they’ll be cancelling recess,” he said. “Some of the cancellations are without even first talking with the [union] local about whether administration can even do the coverage, and we find that very disappointing.”
In some cases, cancelling recess could mean the school day is shortened by 15 minutes.
Iker explained that voluntary activities in which teachers are involved will continue during the first phase of the planned job action, but some teachers’ duties will be left to principals, vice-principals, and other management.
“What we won’t be doing is supervision, before and after school, during recess, and at lunchtime, which we don’t do right now,” Iker said.
“Our expectation is that, according to the essential services legislation, excluded staff … will be picking up supervision,” he said.
Completely unfair to take recess away. Imagine how adults would complain if we took coffee breaks away!