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T an Satesman Bowmanville, June 16, 1976 3 Teachers' Wages A Touchy Issue Teachers' salaries was a subject that representatives from various, municipalities and the Northumberland and Newcastle Board of Education were reluctant to discuss at a meeting on June 3rd. The request for the meeting to talk about rising education costs was made by the municipalities in the Board of Education's jurisdiction. Newcastle's municipal representative councillor Ann Cowman told the members of the board that raising student- teacher ratios and reducing the required number of teachers for a classroom could be one way of bringing the board's budget down. But board trustee Ian Wil- son told the municipal repre- sentatives that student- teacher ratios were basically controlled by the province. Dr. Wilson, chairman of the board's finance committee said having more students in each class could lower the, quality of education. This year's increase in municipal taxes is largely the resuit of secondary and ele- mentary school teachers re ceiving approximately a 26 per cent hike in wages. Although the board's finance committee reduced the budget by almost $1 million through cuts in field trips, transportation and maintenance costs, spending still went up, with a total of $3,767,945 in salary increases. Regular day school teachers received $2,890,857 in salary increases over last year. "Our budget for this year would have stood still with the $1 million cut, exclusive of salary negotiations and exclusive of any increases needed for this year," Dr. Wilson said. If the wage guidelines of the Anti-Inflation Board (AIB) are not accepted the wage demand could go even higher, he added. Some of the municipal representatives including Mrs. Cowman and Percy Township's Reeve, Arthur Wartman urged the board to make a stand against increas- ing teacher salaries. Transfers Given To Principals Two public school principals in the area will take on added responsibility when the fall school season begins. Hampton Junior Public School principal, G. Gleibs and Kirby Centennial School principal, Ian Golder have been transferred to new schools in the western area of the board of educations juris- diction. Mr. Gleibs will become principal of the Kirby and Kendal public schools and Mr. Golder will be transferred as principal of the North, South and West Courtice public schools. It will be the first year that the Northumberland and Newcastle Board of Education bas grouped a number of schools under one principal. Agricultural News Soil and Crop Improvement Association Bus Trip Each year the Durham soil and Crop Improvement Assoc- iation sponsors a bus trip for farmers and their wives in the county to another area of the province. This year, the com- mittee in charge of setting up the tour has lined up a trip to Northumberland and Hastings Counties. The bus tour will take place on Wednesday, July 7th and will be carried out in cooperation with the Victoria County Soil and Crop Improvement Association. An interesting program has been set up and will include the following: A visit to the farm of Steve Vizmeg and Sons, No. 2 Baltimore where a feedlot operation and cash grain corn operation is carried out. Mr. Vizmeg has a slatted floor beef barn, which holds approximately 200 head of feeders, and he makes use of a bunker silo for corn silage. The next stop on the tour will be to the farm of Jack Dorland and Sons, No. 7, Brighton. This is a commercial Holstein operation, milking 55-60 cows in a free stall setup. In addition, Dorlands put up top-quality forage for the dairy cattle. The next stop on the tour will be to the Smithfield Experimental Farm. Research into problems in fruit, vegetable and horticult- ural crops is carried out at the experimental station. Follow- ing lunch at the Experimental Farm, the next stop will be at the farm of Doug and Don Farrell, R.R.2, Roslin in Hastings County. This is a farrow to finish swine oper- ation where they feed high moisture grain corn as the basic ration. The Farrell's have in recent years convert- ed it over from a grain program to a corn program and their philosophy as to why they did make a conversion is very interesting. The last stop of the day will be to the Pancake Hill Pasture Farm ir. Hastings County. Work has been done at this farm to renovate very rough pasture land with the use of Trefoil. As well, suspension fencing has been put into use on this farm and people on this trip will have a chance to see how it is working. A Notice has gone out to all present and past Soil and Crop Improvement Association members about the Tour and if you are considering taking in the day and seeing a number of interesting farm and research stops, we would suggest that you return the information form as soon as possible. Durham Junior Farmers Host United Kingdon Delegate We mentioned in an earlier news column that the Durham County Junior Farmers would be acting as host for one of the United Kingdom delegates to visit Ontario this summer. Miss Pamela Scruton of Eng- land will arrive along with a m'îmber of other young people i the United Kingdom on '\ne 16th. Following visits and orientation in Toronto, the ý oung people will start on their program of living with host families during the up- coming summer months. Pamela will arrive in Durham County on June 18th and for the week of June 18 - June 25, she will be living with Mr. and Mrs. Richard VanCamp and family, R.R.1, Blackstock. For the second week of her stay in Durham County, Pamela will.be hosted by Mr. and Mrs. Roy McLaughlin and family of RR.1, Nestleton. While in the county, Pamela will have a chance to take part in Junior Farmers and 4-H activities, -learn more about the agricultural programs in Durham County and meet a number of people during her two week stay. We want to take this opportunity to wel- come Pamela to Ontario and specifically, Durham County and we trust she will enjoy the visit to our area. Insect and Crop Disease Report With the warm weather we've had during the past week, growth bas been very rapid in crops and across the county. Haying operations are well under way with haylage going into the silors starting around June 7th. With baying operations well underway, we should be able to get around any problems that alfalfa weevil might have caused in alfalfa fields. Our concern now lies with the spring grain and corn crops. We, again want to urge farmers to continue checking their spring grain fields for any sign of cereal leaf beetle, damage caused by these bèetles can be recognized by the stripping of the top surface of the leaf, giving a silvery appearance to the leaves. If you do see this in your fields, please contact the Agricultural office, so that we can start checking in the surrounditig areas to see that at what stage the beetles will be at. In addition we received report from western New York State that army worm is quite heavy in that area, and we would urge growers to be on the lookout for this pest. We have put out a black light trap to monitor the numbers of insects, especially army- worm, so that we will be reporting in the weeks to come as to numbers that we are catching. Winter wheat and winter barley appear to be coming along very well, with these crops either in head; or coming into head. There shouldn't by any significant problem with these crops from now till harvest, although there bas been some snow mold and root rot in these crops - noticed earlier in the growing season. If you come across an insect or disease problem that you are not familiar with, we would ap- preciate it, if you contact the agricultural office and in this way, we will be able to stay on top of any problems o. situations that may develop. The rapid growth that bas taken place in crops during the past week has caused some problems for area farm- ers with regards to what chemicals to use for spraying. We have had reports of some damage done to crops because of the spray that was used, or the timing when spray was applied. If you have the 1976 Guide to Chemical Weed Control, follow the instruct ions in this book closely, so as not to cause burning or setback problems in your crops. If you do not have this book, and are wondering what sprays to use, get in touch with the agriculture office and we can give you the proper recommendations, depending on stage of growth and devxelornenf in vour crops