A highly debated Bill 35: An Act Respecting Empowering the School System, pushed ahead in the New Brunswick Legislature this week with few amendments.
One of the more controversial issues is a plan that the Education Minister claims will help the many students currently waiting for psycho educational testing, due to a shortage of school Psychologists..
Dominic Cardy says the bill will allow trained Resource teachers to do the testing, to create Personal Learning Plans for the students who need them, “So what we’re doing here is dealing with a backlog of thousands of kids, in many cases poor kids, who don’t have the help they need, and we are doing our best to get rid of that backlog with a program that has been shown to work elsewhere.”
Cardy says, this is all about doing assessments for students who are dealing with learning disabilities and other challenges.
Currently, Psycho-educational testing is only done by Psychologists, “We are going to hire Psychologists, already in the plan, already in the budget. Bill 35 means we are going to add to the teams that support those School Psychologists by hiring a team of Resource teacher, give them one thousand hours of training so they can conduct Psycho-educational Assessments,” Cardy says.
Meantime, the Executive Director for the College of Psychologists says they are feeling a bit defeated by Bill 35.
Mandy McLean says their biggest concern is the students that are at risk of misdiagnosis, “I feel comfortable from an Administration standpoint, that the teachers will be able to be trained, they are bright professionals. It is really going to come down to the diagnosis of students with learning disabilities.”
McLean believes it won’t be a quick fix to the backlog, as Cardy claims.
She says it is going to take some time before it goes into effect, because Resource teachers need to be trained, “I think we are just going to work with our Psychologists to ensure that they are feeling as comfortable as possible with what is going to happen. We will continue to advocate through the Department of Health with the strategies they are trying to develop for recruitment, and keep the best interests of the kids at heart.”
The last step for Bill 35 in the New Brunswick Legislature is Royal Assent.
