Worrying Portrait of Education Professionals’ Working Conditions in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and Baie-James Region

Sara-Léa Bouchard, CKAJ collaboration

A worrying portrait of the state of working and practice conditions of education professionals in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and Baie-James was unveiled on Tuesday. A result which turns out to be far from positive for the region.

“The survey reveals that a worrying proportion of 73% of education professionals in the region say that students do not receive the professional services to which the Education Act entitles them. It’s alarming,” first indicated Marc Nolet, president of the Union of Education Professionals of Lac-Saint-Jean, Pays-des-Bleuets and Baie-James (SPPLPB-CSQ).

These highlights come from the survey conducted by the Federation of Education Professionals of Quebec (FPPE-CSQ), the Union of Education Professionals of Saguenay (SPPÉS-CSQ) and the SPPLPB-CSQ .

Also, among the professionals surveyed, 81% of them believe that there are not enough of them to meet the needs of students, while 61% think that they cannot act sufficiently in prevention.

While several positions remain vacant at present, including in psychology, psychoeducation, guidance and speech therapy, almost half (44%) of the region’s professional staff report being overworked, mainly due to too many mandates to complete (88%), and an increase in the number of students and teachers to support (62%).

A similar situation everywhere in Quebec

Furthermore, Jacques Landry, president of the FPPE-CSQ, maintains that the difficult situation experienced in Saguenay and Lac-Saint-Jean is similar to that experienced by professional staff throughout Quebec.

“Our survey, which received more than 4,000 responses, indicates that 41% of professionals are considering leaving their job. The reasons given are, in order of importance, salaries that are too low (50%), the burden of the task (47%) and the lack of recognition (45%). I would describe the situation as alarming,” he comments in a press release.

Solutions to suggest

Education professionals are not giving up and have great hope in the ongoing negotiations for the renewal of their collective agreement. Nearly 70% of them think that establishing mandatory thresholds for diversified and comprehensive professional services in each school would allow staff to work more on prevention and be able to meet the needs of students.

However, Jacques Landry indicates that the conclusions in the file are taking longer than necessary. “Currently, discussions at the negotiating tables are stagnating. The government is not proposing anything concrete to improve the current situation which continues to deteriorate. We hope that he will take advantage of the start of the school year to send us the message that the needs of Quebec students are among his priorities. »