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4 The Canadian Statesman, Bowmanville, Wednesday, April 17,1996 W&t Caimbtiut statebman Former Publishers and Partners Rev. John M. Climic and W. R. Climie 1854 -1878 M. A. James, 1878 -1935 • Norman S. B. James, 1919 -1929 G. Elena James, 1929 -1947 • Dr. George W. James, 1919 -1957 Produced weekly by James Publishing Company Limited P.O. Box 190,62 King St. W., Bowmanville, Ontario L1C 3K9 905-623-3303 Internet - statesman@ocna.org Fax 905-623-6161 HOURS: Monday to Friday 9:00 a.m, until 5:00 p.m. For 142 Years, Our First Concern Has Been Our Community Publisher - John M. James Assoc. Publisher - Richard A. James Plant Manager - Donald J. Bishop Ad. Manager - Brian G. Purdy Editor - Peter Parrott Production Rich Patterson, Laurens Kaldevvav, Doug Lugtenburg, Sharon McMullen, . Barb Patterson, Ralph Rozema, lim Snoek, Vance Sutherland, Jim Tuuromo Advertising Editorial Frank Kelly, I. avertie Morrison Brad Kelly, Lorraine Manfredo, Laura ). Richards Office Angela Luschcr, Debbie Chamberlain, Junia Hodge, Grace McGregor, Nancy Pleasancc-Sturman, Marilyn Rutherford Education Cutbacks During a meeting at Bowmanville High School last week, about 1200 students had the opportunity to question Bowmanville's public school trustees and Durham East MPP John O'Toole over the impact of provincial cutbacks on education. There were few answers. Essentially, we don't know how the educational cutbacks might affect local students because the public school board has not yet made major decisions on how it will trim about $9 million from its budget. But, you can get a pretty good idea of where the cuts might come. We emphasize, of course, that this is still speculative. However, unless school boards arc willing to hand their taxpayers huge increases, they'll have to take some, if not all, of the following following actions: First of all, junior kindergarten might be cut and adult education programs may be either curtailed or totally re-organized. Further layoffs might be announced in the non-union areas of the school board. (You may recall dial the 312 staff layoffs announced earlier in the month applied only to teachers and other employees covered by collective bargaining.) School trustees and administrators may seek concessions from staff in order to save money and therefore avoid laying off teachers. Teacher preparation time is frequently cited as one area where costs could be trimmed. The savings would allow more teachers teachers to retain their jobs, but would take away one of the benefits which teachers have ■negotiated. More co-operation in areas such as busing and purchasing will take place between the public and separate school boards. School boards may be pressured to cut programs such as art or music and to cut extra-curricular activities. School boards may have to recruit volunteers from the community community to take on tasks such as coaching school teams, or working with drama groups and musical groups. Boards may try to hire non-teaching personnel to handle tasks such as guidance counselling. *' School boards may undergo boundary changes as the provincial government attempts to cut administrative costs by eliminating some boards altogether. The Northumberland and Clarington Board of Education would be among the victims of such a cutback. The Sweeney Report would place Clarington in the Durham Board of Education and the remainder of the board would be linked with Peterborough. New school buildings of the future may not be built by school boards, but by the private sector. Such buildings would then be used by boards of education under some kind of a lease arrangements. Exactly how many of these ideas will be implemented remains unknown. One thing that students at last week's meeting stressed was the need for ecucators, .parents, politicians and everyone else with an interest in education to work together in meeting the challenge imposed by the cutbacks. There were concerns that unrealistic solutions may be imposed by politicians on the students, parents and educators who have the most to lose from these actions. MPP John O'Toole has been meeting with parents and educators to discuss the reforms to the school system. And last week's meeting was further evidence of all sides getting together to work on the problem. :,■},,, t. But, it remains to be seen whether decision-makers will listen to these concerns and act upon them. Both trustees and MPP John O'Toole would probably downplay the notion that schools are facing a full-scale crisis. For instance, trustees assured the students that many of the teachers who received lay-off notices will be re-hired by next September. In short, the sky may not be falling on Ontario's educational system. But, there's plenty of evidence that the plaster is dropping off the ceiling. Either way, there's cause for alarm. The results of the educational overhaul should be known for certain by next September. But you must act now if you want to inform your politicians at the local and provincial provincial level what you think. Before it's too late. 0PSEU Battle Continues K4Ve looked eVeA/wloeiGe. under -For AYjs>«=>ing > L 'for' (gulf) missing SohnSt lid. -files. Letter to the Editor MPP Makes "Inaccurate" Statement Dear Sir: After three weeks of reading the inane, pompous pulp of John O'Toole, I am forced to reply. 1 am an OPS EU member - a correctional officer at the Whitby Jail. Mr. O'Toole dispenses the Tory party line of "fair settlement", settlement", and "obligation to negotiate" negotiate" yet forgets that a major reason for this strike was the government's unfair attempt to wrest control of our Pension Plan from us. Several years ago, OPSEU bargained for control, giving up $500 million in concessions in other areas to the government. This year, the government tried to regain control through legislation but was overturned in court. They manocuvercd around this court order with the Omnibus bill. I had to strike to get back what I had already paid for. How "fair" was that? As per "gold plated" pensions, pensions, I personally pay thousands thousands every year into my plan. It is certainly not "gold plated" in comparison to an MPP's, such as Mr, O'Toole's, which the Harris govcrnmcnl has continually continually promised to review. The government also denied me, through legislation, basic pcnsion/scvcrnncc rights enjoyed by every other person in Ontario. How "fair" was that? The essential services agreement agreement that lie criticized was negotiated with his government, government, not the NDP. 1 know from personal experience that worker and public safety was in danger by lltc actions of managers managers of the Corrections Ministry. Mr. O'Toole would better serve his constituents if he developed and put forward a "reasonable and fair" agenda rather than just blindly following following the party line. Duane Harrison EDITOR'S NOTE - Our MPP would be in hot water with his government if he refused to follow the "party line". Dear Editor: ■ . In Mr. O'Table's last two columns he has made statements statements about education in Ontario which arc blatantly inaccurate. In last week's column, he states that "Ontario spends $500 more per child on education education than any other province." This is a myth that the Harris Government has been bandying àbout as fact. The reality is that this figure does not reflect expenditures on Public Education. This figure includes Private School spending per pupil as well as public funding. Ontario spends less per pupil than many provinces and more than some. In fact, Ontario's expenditure per pupil is about average in Canada. In the column published on April 3rd, Mr. O'Toole writes about Bill 31 which will set up the College of Teachers. He suggests that most pro fessions arc self-regulating and goes on to compare the College of Teachers to the College of Physicians and Surgeons. However, doctors and lawyers arc able to choose their clients. As teachers in public education, education, we cannot choose our students students nor our work days; we must accept all students and our working hours are legislated.. Both the Minister of Education and the Ontario Teachers Federation arc charged with governing the education system in Ontario. What possible purpose purpose could a College of Teachers serve? If it were to provide a valuable service to these teachers, would it not be enthusiastically endorsed by its clients? In fact, in a work place democratic vote, teachers voted 95% against this unnecessary bureaucracy! However, the government seems determined to pass this bill. The Bill's main thrust seems to be punish ment, as three-quarters of this bill deals with how to "discipline" "discipline" offending teachers, including the right to search the home of a teacher accused of incompetence!(Scct. 34.3) and a $10,000 fine if the member opposes this search! (Sect. 47). In conclusion, I find it very sad and disheartening to see such a vicious attack upon one of the finest education systems in the world. As parents, teachers, teachers, students, and taxpayers, we must stand up to this demolition demolition of Public Education. It is the foundation of our democracy. democracy. As our public education is destroyed, we will all pay. Sincerely, Judy A. Hagerman EDITOR'S NOTE - Your explanation concerning the supposed additional cost of $500 per pupil is most interesting. interesting. We'd like to hear our MPP's comments on this matter. MR Shifts The Blame Dear Editor: As a voter of the Durham riding, I appreciate our MP Alex Shepherd's admission in The Statesman of April 10, that hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid arc being wasted on non-deserving countries. Especially shocking was the fact that hard-earned Canadian tax dollars go to the Turks and Caicos Islands, places that, Mr. Shepherd admits, don't have any income tax. And, even harder to stomach stomach is the $ 162-million annually annually Canada donates to China. China is one of the most powerful powerful and fastest growing powers powers in the world, with seemingly seemingly unlimited resources when it comes to building rockets and nuclear weapons. In an indirect way, our tax dollars arc subsidizing subsidizing these activities while ordinary Canadians can only hope that these weapons may never land here. It scents unfair of Mr. Shepherd to shift the blame for these abuses, away from the really guilty ones, to ordinary Canadians by stating: "It appears Canadians arc not only overly , generous, but also not particularly caring about who gets aid." Mr. Shepherd knows better than that! Ordinary Canadians have too much common sense. This squandering of resources is done by Liberals who refuse to be held accountable. By Liberals like Jean Chretien and Mr. Shepherd himself, who should have said: "It appears Liberals arc not only overly generous, but also not particularly particularly caring about who gets aid." But, what can we expect from a government that is so proud that its last deficit was only $32-billion and is still raising taxes? Typical is the redent 1 1/2-ccnls-a-litrc increase in gasoline taxes. When Jban Chrétien was finance minister under Trudeau, he used to say: "Budget deficits don't matter." The present situation still reflects that same attitude. Clearly; the Prime Minister hasn't changed much. At that time he believed in spend, spend, spend, and tax, tax, tax, and so docs he today. Hopefully, Mr. Shepherd will continue to entertain us with more revelations about Liberal waste. It will strengthen our determination to punish these spenders at the ballot box. Sincerely, Evert Vroegh Hampton, Ontario EDITOR'S NOTE - Surely the foreign aid spending was not just the Invention of the present government, but was carried out by a long line of federal governments before Jean Chrétien. by Rick James Celebration for a Great Teacher There wasn't a dry eye in the room on Monday evening at Bowmanville Senior Public School as friends, family and colleagues colleagues paid tribute to one of Bowmanville's Bowmanville's great teachers, Mel Putnam. Mel was diagnosed with cancer last October and has been unable to return to his beloved classroom and students. In his own words, he has good days and bad days. From the hundreds of people who attended attended to wish him well, the smile on his face indicated this was one of his best days. Unfortunately, the line-up to see Mel ' was so huge, I wasn't able to speak to him other than a quick "hello" from a distance. That's too bad, since I'm sure he would have liked to continue our debate about whether teachers arc overpaid. When we last argued this, he was going to write a response response to my column on toilet paper, but decided it wasn't worth wasting the paper. I responded to that by saying, "That's fine, just make sure you do it on your own time, Putnam. Not during class time." Since I attended Vincent Massey Public School, and Mel taught at Central, 1 never had him as a home room teacher. But, Mel is one of those teachers whose stellar reputation reputation travelled between schools. Because of his influence and involvement in the education education system and the community, Mel was able to teach more than his own students students about the importance of values, goals, and a competitive spirit. To put it in simple terms, he is one of those people you would describe as being "one heck of a real, nice guy." Best wishes, Mel. Oh, and just between you and me, for everything you did in and outside of the classroom, I guess 1 have to concede that you are one of the few teachers teachers that isn't overpaid. There, now we won't have to waste any toilet paper. The Masters Simply unbelievable. Those are the only words I can use to describe The Augusta National Golf Club, home of The Masters golf tournament in Georgia. Thanks to an inside track with my old friend, Seth "Snuffy" Hunt, I was able to get four tickets to the practice rounds for this year's event. "Snuffy" has been a marshal at the tournament for years, and slipped me an application about a year ago. More than 500,000 people applied for practice round tickets, but only 100,000 got them. For the first time ever, I finally held a winning ticket in a lottery. The Masters is the pinnacle of golf competition, so it wasn't very difficult to assemble a foursome to see the world's best players compete for the sport's most coveted title. If you can win a green jacket at Augusta, you go into the history books with legendary names like Hogan, Nicklaus and Palmer. Accompanying me in the lick to Augusta were Jon Hancock, Paul Morris and Bob Owen. We're all keen golfers and have played many different courses over the years. But, nothing could have prepared prepared us for what we saw at Augusta National. Although television coverage can give you a glimpse of the natural beauty and fierce competition, it falls short of delivering the "feel" of Augusta. One of the first things we noticed was the hilly terrain. Television cameras tend to "flatten" the landscape. But, after walking walking the course for three days, 1 don't ever recall seeing a course with such dramatic changes in elevation. Even the hills of Newcastle Golf Course can't compare to Augusta. The sixth green drops eight feet across its width, and the eighth green is located located almost 100 feet above the tee area, more than 500 yards away. The 18th is deceptively deceptively steep, as players must place their tee shots carefully to avoid a steep uphill lie. Heading out to the back nine, the 10th The Golden Bear -- Six time Masters' winner Jack Nicklaus tees off during practice practice for this year's'tournament. Directly behind him are Jon Hancock, Bob Owen and Paul Morris. hole drops 75 feet to a lightning fast green that cost Scott Hoch a championship in 1989 when he missed an 18 inch putt in a playoff with Nick Faldo. After seeing the players putt on that green, I can understand how he missed it. Another striking feature of Augusta is the ultra-lush grass. Without any exaggeration, exaggeration, the fairways are better than the carpet carpet in most people's home. Even the rough, if you can call it that, is better than most golf courses' fairways. We couldn't get close enough to stand on the greens, but you could tell by the roll of the ball that they must be as smooth as a bathtub and just as fast. When you consider the speed and slope of the greens, you could probably practice your putting on the windshield of a car. Then there was the landscaping. Augusta is manicured better than any park or nursery I've ever seen. Between the pine trees, the dogwoods and the azaleas, it's a bonus that the most famous tournament tournament in golf happens to be played there. Even with more than 50,000 people walking walking across the fairways, the turf wasn't damaged. How do they do that? Could you imagine what your lawn would look like if that many people walked across it seven days in a row. Unlike most of our lawns, however, Mother Nature docs receive quite a bit of help at Augusta. For example, under the 12th green is a series of pipes that heats the green in winter and cools it in the sweltering Augusta summer. Heated or cooled water is sent through the pipes, which in turn heats or cools the green. The Continued on Page 9.