Talks have broken off between the provincial government and the British Columbia Teachers' Federation (BCTF) for finding a resolution for bills 27 and 28.
The education ministry recently removed the issue from collective agreement bargaining and assigned the related negotiations to the Public Sector Employers' Association (PSEA).
Cariboo-Chilcotin Teachers' Association (CCTA) president Joan Erb says the bills 27 and 28 negotiation breakdown is not her only disappointment, but also the employer's "arrogant" attitude at the table.
"They do not want to sacrifice any management rights; they want complete control. There's just no discussion; it's 'our way or the highway'."
Introduced by then-education minister Christy Clark in 2002, the bills stripped class size and class composition from teachers' collective bargaining rights, and then a British Columbia Supreme Court ruling last April deemed this unconstitutional.
Erb says the government is not interested in discussing any proposals that would set limits on class sizes or minimum levels of staffing as contractual guarantees.
"To me the whole tone is worse than what it was at the [collective] bargaining table. It's a total lack of respect for what we're trying to do."
The PSEA office declined to comment, but instead forwarded recent statements by Education Minister George Abbott, issued after the two parties ceased discussions.
"I am extremely disappointed that talks have broken down on Bill 28. Government put a thoughtful, constructive proposal on the table backed by a $165-million investment to better support teachers," said Abbott.
Noting the court gave a deadline of April 2012 to resolve these issues, he added the province has been "working with the BCTF in good faith" on finding a resolution.
"We advised the BCTF at the outset of these discussions that in order to meet the deadline imposed by the court, government would have to turn its mind to considering and preparing corrective legislation by the end of November 2011 if we were not making any progress.
"... we are now at a point where we have a responsibility to meet our legislative obligations."
Erb says she fully expects the resulting act will include no language assuring teachers of class size restrictions.
"[PSEA] keeps coming back to this Class Organization Fund [COF] pot of money, and school districts apply for it according to their class size, class composition issues."
The problem with that, Erb adds, is it places all school districts in competition for the funds, and pits them against each other rather than remaining supportive of each other.
Abbott states the money was put on the table to address high priority challenges to student learning, arising from complex class organization.
The education minister adds the BCTF's latest proposal in the collective bargaining would require as much as a 50 per cent increase in the number of teachers in B.C. at a cost of more than $1 billion.
Erb explains the ministry's offer continues to include no pay raises for teachers, but in the Cariboo-Chilcotin school district, she sees that as a lower priority to teachers.
"I know many, many members will take some reasonable class size/class composition language over pay increases because we're burning out really fast.
"If we're going to last in this profession, we need some changes."
Meanwhile, Dec. 5 marked the 60th day of negotiations at the separate bargaining table where the BCTF and the BC Public School Employers' Association continue to struggle reaching a new collective agreement.