This was the right thing to do. It is money well-spent. With the creation of this new position, educators are optimistic that extracurricular activities will return to our high schools, in some fashion, come September. This couldn t have worked without the cooperation and partnership between the two school boards, Gouthro said.
Kids come first.
The recommendation to create this new position came from the Task Force on Extracurricular Activities, formed by the Lakehead District School Board last fall to establish a permanent strategy on extracurricular activities, one that recognized the changes in teaching workloads but also built on partnerships in the community to guarantee that extracurricular activities continued. Teachers in Thunder Bay, and right across the province, withdrew from after-school activities in protest over Bill 74, which increased the workload of high school teachers by one class last September. The government formed its own Provincial Task Force in January, and earlier this month, adopted some of the group s recommendations by giving greater flexibility regarding average class size, and broadening the definition of instructional time to include remediation, on-calls and supervision. This fall, there will be some teams and clubs in place in our schools.