Education Matters Online
Feature

Volume 4, Issue 1: October 3, 2005

For a number of years, members of PSSP bargaining units around the province have been concerned about the “outsourcing” of PSSP services within school boards. Outsourcing occurs when other agencies send PSSP-type employees into schools to perform work at no charge to boards that could and should be provided by our members. OSSTF has always been strongly opposed to contracting out (i.e. giving our jobs to a company to whom the board gives a contract), but “outsourcing” of our services and the increase in community partnerships in which school boards are entering has only recently generated the same level of concern at the provincial level. The Ministry of Children and Youth has been promoting community partnerships and in its document entitled “Children and Youth Mental Health Fund: Toronto Regional Plan” (December 2, 2004), it is stated:

“Participants identified that there needs to be a continuum of services available to school-aged children and youth, and that the school environment should be considered a hub for access to children’s mental health services and supports. Specific strategies included outreach services into schools (particularly to identified high-risk communities) from children’s mental health centres, the capacity to offer easily accessible crisis intervention, in-school teams, and referral for more intensive services as required.”

PSSP collective agreements typically do not have strong job security and “no contracting out” language, let alone language to prevent community agencies from partnering with school boards and providing services that could and should be provided by our members. School boards should be hiring additional PSSP staff to provide these services rather than allowing outside agencies to provide these services within our schools. For the most effective results, staff working with high-needs students in school boards must be employees of school boards.

Not only is outsourcing a concern provincially, but it is also happening currently within the Thames Valley District School Board. The District 11 PSSP Executive has raised the issue of outsourcing both at PSSP Mutual Concerns and at District 11 Executive Council. Locally, the PSSP Executive is trying to work with the Board to ensure, at the very least, that our members are involved in “gate-keeping” with respect to new programs coming into our schools. In our discussions with the Board, we have been pointing out liability issues, age of consent issues, the lack of control over content taught by other than Board employees and poor information flow between agencies and the Board. We have proposed the development of a policy or protocol that would need to be followed before outside workers could provide programs within our schools.

The Provincial Executive has committed to an action plan to help fight outsourcing. OSSTF has realized the seriousness of the threat that community partnerships have on its PSSP members. The action plan includes the following:

* Development of training sessions on lobbying and political action for PSSP council and PSSP bargaining units. These sessions will have particular emphasis on empowering our members to take concrete actions towards protecting our jobs.

* Development of a research project on the importance of offering school-based PSSP services. The research project should be conducted by an outside agency or researcher to increase objectivity with particular emphasis on student achievement outcomes.

* Distribution of an Education Watch that emphasizes PSSP services in particular.

* Lobbying - Preliminary fact finding and lobbying meetings with the Assistant Deputy Ministers from the Education Ministry, Ministry of the Child and Youth Services, and Ministry of Community and Social Services are proposed.

* Organize meetings with executives of Toronto, Ottawa, Peel, Hamilton and Thames Valley PSSP Bargaining Units to discuss the issues of job protection and lobbying with particular emphasis on offering training for local action.

* The provincial president could arrange for meetings with the leaders of OPSEU and CUPE who represent the majority of the unionized community agency professionals, to discuss a mutual cooperation strategy.

The issue of outsourcing was discussed at length at the first PSSP Sector Council meeting held in August during Summer Leadership Conference 2005. The following Guiding Principles on Partnerships/In-Sourcing were agreed upon by Sector Councillors:

▸ All partnerships should be governed by a formal agreement between the partners, the board and the employee group(s) doing the same or similar work. The partnership agreement will include liability issues, consent issues, work space, services to be provided, communication protocol, etc.

▸ Outside agencies/groups should not replace board employees.

▸ Any partnership agreement should ensure the employees are required to have the same qualification and college affiliations as Board employees.

Let us not take thought for our separate interests, but let us help one another.
(OSSTF Motto)

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