FAE: ‘Teachers don’t get the deal they deserve’

Teachers didn’t get the deal they deserved, according to Mélanie Hubert, president of the Fédération autonome de l’enseignement (FAE).

At a press conference on Monday, the FAE president accepted her members’ verdict on the agreement in principle reached with the Quebec government at the end of December. She refuses to be bitter, relieved or disappointed.

“We’ve come a long way, we’ve improved the pay scale […] but we’ll have to do more to change working conditions in Quebec schools,” Hubert said. “Our members are telling us it’s not enough.”

Five of its unions voted in favour of the agreement in principle reached with the Quebec government, while four rejected it. And even those who voted in favour gave it lukewarm support.

The suspense ended late Friday afternoon after the Syndicat de l’enseignement de la Haute-Yamaska accepted the agreement by 50.5 per cent, sealing the fate of 66,500 teachers in Quebec.

The FAE had been on a 22-day strike from the end of November. They ended their strike action when a deal in principle was reached December 28, 2023.

Hubert believes that “the work will have to continue” to lighten the load for teachers and defend public schools.

“The real victory will be achieved when public schools finally have the means to accomplish their mission, and we don’t have to spend a month in the street going without pay, to get there,” adds Hubert.

Annie-Sara Lemieux McClure is an elementary teacher in Montreal. Her union, l’Alliance des professeures et professeurs de Montréal, voted in favour of the agreement by just slightly over 50 per cent as well. 

“I think even the people that said yes, they doing it with crying a little bit.” said McClure.

“We poured our heart into that strike, and to get only that? It just reflects that the government that’s in front of us, even if he saying education is his priority, I mean, no.”

Marion Miller, a high school teacher in Montreal says, the low-rate of acceptance gives an accurate representation of how Quebec teachers are feeling.

“It’s not the deal we deserved. I don’t think there’ll be enough concrete changes in my day-to-day workload in the needs of the students in my classroom being addressed. I don’t think that those changes are happening. So, what teachers deserve is to be supported in their work, to have classroom compositions that are manageable, to have the extra resources that can help students with special needs and learning difficulties. That’s not there yet. There are a few little budgetary envelopes that are starting to add, but it’s not enough and teachers do deserve more,” said Miller.

“Our students deserve better and that’s such an important thing to remember in the end of this, is we were fighting for students to make things better for them and that’s not happened yet. We have to all as a society take a look at public education and say students deserve better than what they’re getting right now.”

The Syndicat de l’enseignement de la Pointe-de-l’Île, l’Alliance des professeures et professeurs de Montréal, the Syndicat de l’enseignement de l’Outaouais and the Syndicat de l’enseignement de l’Ouest de Montréal also voted in favour.

The four other unions, l’enseignement de la région de Laval, Basses-Laurentides, l’enseignement des Seigneuries et de la région de Québec voted against.

Voting on the agreement in principle started on Jan. 17.

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews