It’s the Annual Convention of the PEI Teachers’ Federation today and tommorrow at the Convention Centre in Charlottetown and, as I do every year, I went undercover for a while this morning to see what I could see (my cover was quickly blown as I ran into [[Oliver]]’s homeroom teacher, IT teacher, and resource teacher within 5 minutes of arrival; they didn’t out me, though).
Dipping into the convention is a great opportunity to see “behind the scenes” of teaching: there’s a trade show spread out over the halls where you’ll find everyone from the publisher of your child’s textbooks to the friendly folks from Crayola hawking their new magical whiteboard crayons. There are also booths from organizations like the PEI Home and School Federation, Healthy Eating Alliance, the School Milk Foundation and the Community Legal Information Association.
And, of course, there are teachers.
A lot of teachers.
And so walking through the halls is sort of like swimming through “concentrated essence of teacher.” You have to gird yourself lest it all turn into your worst grade 6 nightmare. They are friendly, fortunately, and don’t seem to mind interlopers.
And so I recommend that if you’re an interested parent – or, indeed, an interested citizen who wants to see what your teacher employees are up to – you drop down Thursday or Friday for a few minutes. Nobody will ask you for ID and as long as you carry yourself a little teacher-like you should get away with it.
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I am Peter Rukavina and this is my blog. I am a writer, letterpress printer, and a curious person.
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Robert RollbackOnce upon a
Robert Rollback
Once upon a time Prince Edward Island voted red
We looked toward Ms. Callbeck
‘Be premier,’ we said
The first province in Canada to give a woman the lead
We trusted her to know us, what we want and what we’d need
Callbeck looked at the numbers and didn’t like what they might spell
‘$100 million deficits will destroy this province, and this party will go to hell’
Premier Callbeck decided right then and right there
She’d cut public sector wages, what is necessary must be called ‘fair’
The people were angry as anyone could see
Which did away with Callbeck, as government went PC
When the Tories were done and Liberals returned
The deficits came with them, as Islanders then learned
Deficits grew as the patronage splurged and spilled
Not a single Liberal elite had pockets that were unfilled
Debts upon debts with Peter robbing Paul
Ghiz couldn’t solve the money problems, or very much, at all
$100 million deficits, as predicted, became the norm
Liberals brought our finances into a perilous, addictive storm
Troubled once again to plug the holes in their strainer
They returned to their old habits without time to think
They’d pull the plug on pensions from the bottom of the sink
The prophecy from Callbeck seems to have come true
So after the Robert Rollback, we’ll fix it with team blue
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