And while the Minister hopes to see positive results from this year's PSE, many are still concerned. That's because of last year's strike, where teachers countrywide protested for reform measures and went on strike for 11 days. Well not every teacher participated in that strike, and compensation is coming for those teachers that did not participate. Faber told us about the government's compensation plan...
Alex Courtenay, 7News
"Speaking about the teachers who are on strike, we've heard that there's been about 1 million dollars designated to paying back those teachers who stayed back during their Christmas holidays to make up for the days that were lost. Can you discuss that?"
Hon. Patrick Faber, Minister of Education
"Well as I've always said to those who advocated for us to simply pay the teachers that were on strike, it is not as easy as doing that. There were those teachers who diligently went to work throughout the 11 days of the strike and then there were those who of course went in January when the ministry along with the managing authorities of schools agreed on those days - the 6 days if you remember that were makeup days. The 3rd, 4th,5th, 6th of January were to be the first 4 of the 6 days and of course you know the history of that."
"So while it is we cannot pay compensation fully for those teachers who attended school on those days, we thought that it would be important for us to give some kind of honorarium to those teachers and so in consultation with the Prime Minister we have agreed to set aside 1 million dollars that will be divided among those teachers. A small honorarium. We are in the process now of bringing together the figures that will show us those teachers. The managements are submitting those and once we know those numbers, then we will divide the million dollars among those teachers and we will try to make a payment to them. We are hoping that this can be done before the Easter break comes fully."
"So hopefully this week we can get those figures. I think they are already in. We are just now crunching them and pushing them through the system and we will be able to tell you exactly what dollar figure and it is going to be monies that they get in their accounts, because it will go well for Easter I think for many who are looking forward to some kind of compensation for those days."
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