‘You break it, you own it.” We have all been cautioned by that sign in shops dealing with unique and valuable merchandise.
I’ll admit that it might be something of a metaphorical stretch to suggest that had that warning been writ large on the first page of the B.C. teachers’ contract in 2002, it might have given pause for thought to the Gordon Campbell government and its education minister, Christy Clark, before they arbitrarily interfered with the critical class size and composition clauses in the contract.
“You break it, you own it” was apparently never part of the consideration, and now another government, 17 years later, is left red-faced to pick up the pieces and pay for the damage.
In 2002, the Campbell government’s contract-busting legislation removed guarantees of services provided by specialist teachers.
More significantly in terms of long-term consequences, all guaranteed supports for students with special needs were also removed.
The 2002 contract had included specific ratios for specialist teachers, including special-ed instructors. The contract defined the number of and under what circumstances children with special needs could be in a regular classroom. Teachers trained specifically for the task.
But since the government scrubbed the class-composition clauses, B.C. has, according to B.C. Teachers Federation data, lost almost 700 special-education teachers and innumerable specially trained education assistants — those who work one-on-one with children integrated into regular classrooms.
Over the years, fewer teachers and teacher trainees chose to become teachers of children with special needs. School districts also found themselves increasingly unable to find trained education assistants to work with kids and assist with inclusion into regular classrooms.
After years of legal wrangling between the teachers’ union and various iterations of government, the Supreme Court of Canada decision took all of 20 minutes to overturn the 2002 interference with the teacher contract.
This left the current B.C. government to own the problem, pick up the pieces, and suddenly find and hire hundreds of teachers and teacher assistants at a cost of between $250 million and $300 million more each year.
But let’s back up for a minute and define why the issue of class composition is such a major headache for government and school trustees and, worse still, such a major heartache for parents of children with special needs.
Class composition refers to the number of students with specific, identified needs who must be fully assessed before being assigned to a regular classroom.
Even then, an “individualized education plan” and an additional educational assistant are both needed to make the inclusion philosophy work successfully.
The funding formula, while currently under revision, classifies kids into a cascading series of funding categories depending on the degree of disability.
Funded disabilities range from being physically dependent (including being deaf or blind) at approximately an additional $38,000 above normal operating grants to about $9,000 for those kids identified with serious intellectual challenges who express their disability behaviourally.
The funding falls well short of meeting actual needs.
In real terms, the child who manifests a range of behavioural problems can require as much or even more assistance than the child who is experiencing the full range of physical dependency.
Hovering over school districts, alongside the expectations of parents of children needing additional support, is the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Section 15 of the charter makes it clear that every individual in Canada — regardless of physical or mental disability — is to be considered equal.
This means that governments must not discriminate or fail, either by commission or omission, to meet the needs of children or adults with disabilities. That isn’t “may not,” but “must not.”
Since 2002, three other things have changed significantly: First, parents are much more comfortable advocating for themselves; second, society has become more accepting of and inclusive of people with a range of special needs; and finally, medical research has led to a remarkable surge in both diagnosis and identification.
But back to my admittedly feeble metaphor: You picked up that tempting piece of fine porcelain china and in the process of admiring it, you dropped it.
You had read the sign and understood the terms about handling and assuming responsibility for breakage. You had thereby entered into a form of tacit contract about and before handling the china.
Not much choice now: You broke it — you own it. Pick up the pieces and pay for the damage, apologize and never let it happen again.
Geoff Johnson is a former superintendent of schools.
