The Newfoundland and Labrador Teacher’s Association says they have significant concerns with the recommendations in the Premier’s Economic Recovery Team report for the provincial public K-12 education system.

NLTA President Dean Ingram will be sharing his response to the report at 1:30 p.m. this afternoon.

The PERT suggests extending the school day to eight hours—not for kids, but for teachers in order to allow time for preparation and development.

The team also recommends that we consider a two-year full-day kindergarten term in the schools to help parents with childcare.

Many were surprised to see that some teachers coming out of university are not qualified to teach the core subjects in K-6. Green recommends that the Faculty of Education review the curriculum.

Greene recommends that principals, vice-principals, and supervisors not be members of the union, the NLTA. In most workplace settings, managers are not unionized.

The PERT recommends that the two school boards—one for English students and one for French students—be reduced to a single all-encompassing board.

The team notes that it costs about $28,000 to educate a child in the Francophone system and about $14,000 in the Anglophone system.