Union of Tertiary Educators of the Bahamas (UTEB) members need a serious reality check

UTEB members need serious reality check
tribune242 editorial



WITH desperate parents having to transfer their children from private schools to an overcrowded public school system where there is now no room for them, we get news that members of the College of the Bahamas' teachers union are still not comfortable with their salaries.

At a time like this when hard working Bahamians -- who do not have the luxury of long summer vacations as do teachers -- are struggling to make ends meet and are forced to adjust to the realities of a tight economy, we have teachers, who should be leading by example, bleating about dissatisfaction with their own salaries. Where is the College to get the funds -- raise the fees of struggling students? These teachers should be thankful that they have a job - many Bahamians today are jobless, while others are out on the highway flashing phone cards for sale -- anything to make a few dollars to keep body and soul together. In the meantime, these elite teachers with full job security have the nerve to complain that they do not have enough.

"We feel like the salary package they have offered us really doesn't show us any respect as professionals," one union source told a Tribune reporter yesterday.

"It doesn't respect the work we do. We are talking about the persons who are educating the people who are driving national development.

"We think it really insults us what they have offered us and that they should rethink their position."

We wonder who was disrespecting contractor Charles Nottage who in better times could afford to send his daughter to a private school. Today he is faced with the reality that he can no longer afford this luxury for his child. Mr Nottage told The Tribune that for the past four years his daughter was in a private school. He dreaded the thought of having to move her to a government school, "but it is a necessity right now," he said.

However, he still does not "know what to do" because government schools are so overcrowded that he can find no place for her even there.

How are hard working Bahamians, who at present cannot afford to send their children to private schools, going to find the funds to pay teachers for higher education? If the COB union says the College Board is disrespecting its teachers, then who is respecting Bahamians like Charles Nottage who cannot afford private education for his child?

To make this statement about disrespect shows that these teachers have no sensitivity to the times in which we all live. They must be on a planet of their own creation. And yet people, like Mr Nottage, are willing to face reality and step down until conditions in the country change to give them an opportunity to again start their upward climb.

These are the hard working Bahamians who adjust to hard times and will survive. Those with the attitude of some of these teachers will be left floundering in their own importance. Eventually they get nowhere.

Earlier in the year the College announced that it could not agree to the demands of the Union of Tertiary Educators of the Bahamas (UTEB), which would amount to an average increase of $11,500 per faculty member.

The union had demanded a reduction in workload for its teaches with an increase in pay ranging from 16 per cent to more than 19 per cent, for a total salary increase of 17.5 per cent.

The union seems to have something backward here. Business people are accustomed to paying more for more work -- not more for less. These teachers had better be sent back to school to get their maths in the right order. "The union's $11 million financial package would immediately add $8 million to the College's already overstretched budget and over $3 million annually thereafter," the College said.

The matter went to arbitration with both sides agreeing that they would accept the arbitrators' decision.

The arbitration committee, headed by St Matthew's Anglican Church rector Father James Palacious, said that neither side of the dispute would get exactly what they wanted.

However, when it came to UTEB's financial package, said the arbitrators, it would have been "very reasonable under normal circumstances," however in the end the committee had to adhere to the "economic reality." The committee referred to budget cuts and a still struggling economy. The teachers did not get what they wanted.

Despite this in today's Tribune UTEB president Jennifer Isaacs-Dotson has announced, unless the union gets a signed agreement, it is reserving its right to take a strike vote on Monday when COB is scheduled to open after the summer recess. Do they not have a signed agreement because the salary packet offered fails to show the respect they think their due? Have they rejected it?

Should they strike and create chaos for students on Monday, the College should be closed for a week with no pay for teachers during this time so that they can get a glimmer of what the arbitrators meant when they said they would have to adhere to "economic reality."

We do not think that many Bahamians -- other than some politicians, who appear to be looking for any unrest upon which to capitalise -- will have any sympathy for Mrs Dotson and her UTEB.

August 20, 2010

tribune242 editorial

Bahamas Blog International