Rain-Soaked Rally For Rainbow's Elementary Teachers

By Angela Gemmill

It was a wet, soggy rally at the corner of Barry Downe Road and Westmount Avenue yesterday afternoon as close to 200 teachers marched in the rain.

The rally by elementary teachers with the Rainbow District School Board was to draw attention to their fight for a fair deal since they’ve been without a contract for 14-months.

President of Rainbow Local, Barb Blassutti, says terms within their new agreement need to be different from their high school counterparts because they have different needs and working conditions.

The Elementary Teachers Federal of Ontario continues to negotiate with the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association and the provincial government for a new deal.

The elementary teachers escalated job action yesterday withdrawing from extra curricular activities.

Blassutti says teachers are still planning, teach and assess but they will no longer volunteer their time for things like sports teams, performing arts or clubs.

She says members want the work-to-rule to end so they can go back to business as usual in the classrooms, but she says OPSBA has left them no choice but to take job action.

Premier Kathleen Wynne says teachers have until Sunday to stop their actions or they will face sanctions, including having wages docked.