Congratulations to all the candidates who were elected.

Your 2018-2020 Executive -elect are:

PRESIDENT :
Linda Bartram with 264 votes

FIRST VICE PRESIDENT:
Vincent Zambrano was acclaimed

SECOND VICE PRESIDENT:
Paul Bocking with 269 votes

SECRETARY:
Lillian Speedie-Court was acclaimed

TREASURER:
Michael Fraschetti was acclaimed

EXECUTIVE OFFICERS:
Jamie Whitaker with 235 votes
Coleridge Browne with 227 votes
Brad Mcleod with 187 votes
Laura Drexler with 181 votes

Unsuccessful candidates :
President :
DREXLER, Laura 64 votes
CARTER Janine 41 votes

Second Vice President:
Wilson, Peterr 84 votes

Executive Officer:
LESFRESNE Jon 162 votes
WILSON, Peter 86 votes
MALMUD, Maureen 74 votes
MACDONALD Ross 68 votes
DERRIDER, Ghislain 44 votes
SANDOVAL, Nelson 37 votes

The Elections Committee and Executive will review the results of the vote and the effectiveness of the new voting system to report back to the membership in the fall.

The Government has invited education partners to provide input into questions about class size and, of particular interest to OTBU members, hiring practices. OSSTF will be providing an official response, but members are invited to also provide their input. We encourage you to remain consistent with OSSTF's position on the issues.

Click here for the consulation paper on hiring practices.
Click here for OSSTF position on hiring practices.

Join us Wednesday May 22 at the Old Mill for our Annual General Meeting

Registration starts at 3:30
Meeting from 4:30 - 7:00
Dinner at 7:00

Motions for the meeting may be sent to the OTBU Secretary at lillian.speediecourt@d12.osstf.ca

Come meet your union reps and be part of the action!

PD at Victoria College

Coffee & Registration begins at 8:30am

After a welcome and introduction by the President Linda Bartram, Vice President Paul Bocking will debrief members on the annual OTBU Working Conditiions Survey. After that, Sam Venneri and Theresa Rain from the TDSB OT office will speak.

Following this plenery session, you will have your choice of 3 workshops

1. Cultivating Resilience
2. Wills & Estate Planning
3. Challenging Mysogny

Lunch will be served at 12:30

Please call or email to register.

TDSB officials recently confimed their intention to operationalize clause 20.7.0 of the Collective Agreement. which reads :

"An occasional teacher who refuses four or more assignments for which they are qualified within a period of twenty (20) school days or who cannot be personally contacted for an assignment over a period of fifteen (15) consecutive school days may be removed from the list."

Therefore, if you are unable to work, please ensure you book off your period of unavailability with SFE.

If you are unable to accept work for a period exceeding 3 consecutive weeks, please submit a completed Occasional Teaching Leave Form.

If you know that you will not be available for daily work for a period less than 3 consecutive weeks, it is important that you adjust your SFE profile so you do not receive job offers.

This can be done via the web, or phone:

Creating Unavailable dates via Web Browser Access:

1. Type tdsb.eschoolsolutions.com in the address bar of your Internet Browsing Software.

2. Enter your User ID and Password.

3. Click Submit.

4. Go to Schedule.

5. Click on Unavail Dates.

6. Click on New.

7. Enter Start and End Date Range (MM/DD/YYYY) or use the calendar.

8. Select the All Day check box or enter the time range in HH:MM am or pm format.

9. Select the Call for Future Assignments checkbox, if during the unavailable time period entered you would still like to receive calls for future assignments. Leave box unchecked if you do not want any calls during this time.

10. Click Save.



Creating Unavailable dates via Telephone Access:

1. Dial 416-338-4500

2. Enter your Access ID and PIN.

3. Press 5 to Review or Modify Unavailability Dates.

4. Press 2 to add new Unavailability date(s)

5. Enter Start Date: two digits for the month, two digits for the day, two digits for the year (eg. September 2, 2016 = 090216)

6. Repeat for the End Date

7. Indicate if unavailability is all day

· Press 1 for YES

· Press 2 to enter time of unavailability. Enter two digits for the hour and two digits for the minutes. Press 1 for AM and 2 for PM.

Note: If you are in a full time LTO, you should keep your schedule listed as available Monday to Friday, but make yourself unavailable through the Unavailable dates. Once your LTO is over, please remember to check your Unavailable dates to ensure that you will receive calls for daily work.

Removing Classification or Locations from your profile

If you are interested in removing particular locations or classifications from your SFE profile, you may send your request to dispatchteaching@tdsb.on.ca. Once received, your request will be reviewed and an Occasional Teaching Office representative will be in contact with you.

Beginning with the June 2, 2016 pay, all teachers and PSSP members will no longer be provided with a printed pay statement on pay day.

Your pay statement will be available online only at MyINFO the Wednesday before pay day.

This applies to elementary and secondary contract teachers, all occasional teachers, and all Professional School Services Personnel.

Your T4 slip will also be available online only.

For more information, please contact: myINFO Help Desk by phone at 416-338-4747 - Option 4, or by email at myINFOhelp@tdsb.on.ca

2017-2018 Pay Dates

2018 Municipal Elections:
OSSTF & Toronto Labour Council Endorsements for Mayor, Council & Trustees

Dear OTBU member,
When casting your ballot, please consider these candidates endorsed by OSSTF and the broader labour movement of Toronto. After participating in an extensive interview process, these candidates have been found to express a commitment for education and other public services, labour rights, and a more equitable city. They are also strong candidates who could win their elections, with sufficient support. Particularly in the case of trustees, these elected officials could have significant influence over our working conditions. In addition to the notice below for an upcoming teachers' canvass for Manna Wong, more events for the final weeks of the election are being planned in support of progressive trustees.

In Solidarity,
Your OTBU Executive

Endorsements for Toronto City Council

Mayor- Jennifer Keesmaat

Councillors
Etobicoke-Lakeshore WARD 3- Amber Morley
Humber River-Black Creek WARD 7- Anthony Perruzza
York Centre WARD 6- Maria Augimeri
York SouthWARD 5- Lekan Olawoye
Toronto-St. Paul’s WARD 12- Joe Mihevc
Davenport WARD 9- Ana Bailao
Parkdale-High Park WARD 4- Gord Perks
University–Rosedale WARD 11- Mike Layton
Toronto Centre WARD 13- Kristyn Wong-Tam
Spadina-Fort York WARD 10- Joe Cressy
Willowdale WARD 18- Saman Tabasinejad
Don Valley North WARD 17- Shelley Carroll
Toronto–Danforth WARD 14- Paula Fletcher
Beaches-East York WARD 19- Matthew Kellway
Scarborough North WARD 23- Felicia Samuel
Scarborough-Rouge Park WARD 25- Neethan Shan

TDSB Trustees
Ward1 Etobicoke North - Ali Mohammed-Ali
Ward 2 Etobicoke Centre - Shawn Rizvi
Ward 4 Humber River-Black Creek - Matias de Dovitiis
Ward 7 Parkdale-High Park - Robin Pilkey
Ward 9 Davenport + Spadina-Fort York - Stephanie Donaldson
Ward 10 Toronto Centre + University - Rosedale - Chris Moise
Ward 11 Don Valley West - Amara Possian
Ward 13 Don Valley North - Siham Rayale
Ward 15 Toronto-Danforth - Jennifer Story
Ward 16 Beaches-East York - Phil Pothen
Ward 17 Scarborough Centre - David Smith
Ward 18 Scarborough Southwest - Parthi Kandavel
Ward 19 Scarborough-Guildwood - Samiya Abdi
Ward 20 Scarborough-Agincourt - Manna Wong
Ward 21 Scarborough North - Yalini Rajakulasingam

The election was in June and already the PC gov-ernment has thrown the province into chaos. The sex-ed curriculum deba-cle, the end of cap and trade, the cancellation of the basic income test pro-gram, and the attack on the city of Toronto gov-ernment and school trus-tees are just the beginning. At the moment the prov-ince is being sued by at least six different groups for alleged offenc-es .Those who remember the Harris years know that their strategy was to break things in order to re-assemble in the PC vision. Those days are back. Although only elect-ed by 40% of the popula-tion our system gives a majority government total control to do as they wish, and with the use of
the “notwithstanding clause”, no legal restraint. Expect the PC’s to attack public sector unions, and teachers unions in particular. Ford’s willingness to override charter rights shows that this movement is different from the past. The government faces major deficits, threats to Ontario dairy farmers by the USA and threats to our auto industry, and what do they decide to trample voter rights on: the size of a city govern-ment just weeks before an election. Petty and vindic-tive. No PC MPP can ever claim again to be defenders of law and order.
Prepare for the worst.

The Ontario government launched its curriculum consultation process that invites parents, students, educators and interested individuals or organizations to provide feedback on the education system in Ontario. According to the information on the website, the first part of this consultation went live on September 28, 2018. Open submissions can be made electronically on the website, www.fortheparents.ca, until December 15, 2018. Details on the upcoming online survey and regional town halls have not yet been made available.

The OSSTF Provincial Executive is encouraging all members to participate in this consultation process.

According to the government’s website, “parents across the province” can address concerns and provide feedback in seven identified areas below but the form is not restricted to parents only.

Improving student performance in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM)

Preparing students with needed job skills, such as skilled trades and coding

Improving provincial standardized testing

Ensuring students graduate with important life skills, including financial literacy

Managing the use of technology in classrooms, such as cell phones

Building a new age-appropriate Health and Physical Education curriculum that includes subjects like mental health, sexual health education and the legalization of cannabis

Developing the first-ever Parents’ Bill of Rights

When providing feedback to the government during the consultation process, members are encouraged to consider the numerous challenges that Ontario’s schools and students face relating to program funding, individual supports, and infrastructure. Members should also not feel constrained by the leading nature of at least some of the questions (e.g., “What steps could schools take to ban cellphone use in the classroom?”). OSSTF supports educator professional judgment as a crucial aspect of quality publicly funded education.

To assist members with the government-identified areas of concern for their consultation on the education system in Ontario, a list of related OSSTF policies has been provided (Appendix A). The policies can be found on the OSSTF website at http://www.osstf.on.ca/about- us/constitution-bylaws-policies.aspx .

The OTBU office has been informed by the TDSB payroll department that they will be including the lump sum payment, negotiated in the extension of the central collective agreement, on our November 2 pay stubs. The lump sum payment is equal to 0.5% of your earnings during the 2016-2017 school year.

The lump sum payment for the freeze on the wage grid will be paid on the last pay statement on June 28, 2018.

OSSTF/FEESO has an internal system for providing Certification Rating Statements to its teacher members. These ratings are used to determine the pay rate for teachers by placing them in one of four possible groups. OTBU members should get a ratings statement in order to be paid correctly for LTO positions.

All teachers must complete Application Form 1 for a Certification Rating Statement in order to receive their maximum salary.

Click here for more info and access to the online forms.

To register, please use our contact form.