Living Sky and Light of Christ school divisions are planning for teacher sanctions that will start Thursday. (file photo/battlefordsNOW Staff)

By Angela Brown

Education update

Living Sky and Light of Christ cancelling extracurriculars due to teacher sanctions

Mar 9, 2020 | 5:50 PM

Families with children attending schools in area school divisions will need to consider making new arrangements for the time being if they participate in any extra curricular activities.

The Saskatchewan Teachers Federation (STF) announced Monday that teacher sanctions in the form of restricted services would start Thursday.

As a result, all extracurricular activities in both Living Sky and Light of Christ school divisions, which are all programmed and supervised outside of scheduled class times, will be temporarily cancelled as of March 12.

“We’ll have to get a plan in place at the division level to make sure that we have enough supervisors to cover noon hours,” Living Sky Director of Education Brenda Vickers told battlefordsNOW. “We’ve cancelled extra-curricular programming.

“We are asking parents that if their kids walk to school or if they drive their kids to school to try to arrive as late in the morning as they can,” she said. “If at all possible, if kids can go home for lunch that would be helpful too.”

Riderville

Now for the Hard Part

Dec 10, 2025

Grey Cup!!!

Everything you wanted and more

Nov 21, 2025

Ferland earns Grey Cup ring

'A wonderful human being': High school coach thrilled Logan Ferland is a Grey Cup champion

Nov 17, 2025

Vickers said the division has been working on a contingency plan for a while now in the event that sanctions went ahead.

“We will be using support staff and perhaps some other staff who aren’t part of the STF to pick up some supervision [duties],” she said.

Both school divisions confirmed once started, sanctions would continue until further notice.

“Our intention at Light of Christ Catholic School Division and Living Sky School Division is to do everything possible to keep the public informed so that together we can provide for the safety and well-being of students during this period of job action,” administrators from both divisions said in a joint statement Monday.

The school divisions are sending letters to families outlining further details of the sanctions and how it may impact them. Families are asked to contact schools for details regarding individual activities. The Restriction of Services details can be found on the Saskatchewan Teachers Federation website.

Vickers told battlefordsNOW Living Sky administrators knew sanctions were a possibility, since the Saskatchewan teachers’ union and the province failed to reach an agreement in their current talks related to contract negotiations.

Vickers said she learned last week the teachers’ union met with the Saskatchewan School Boards Association and Saskatchewan Education Minister Gord Wyant.

“I think all parties were hopeful that perhaps they would find a way forward, but clearly that didn’t happen,” Vickers said. “We respect the right of our teachers in their collective bargaining agreement to impose sanctions. So now we’ll just try to get through that in the best way we can.”

The teachers’ union and the province have been on opposite sides during contract negotiations, mainly on the issues of class size and composition. On Feb. 24, it was reported more than 90 per cent of teachers voted to take some sort of action to start negotiations moving, although no job action was announced at that time.

—

angela.brown@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @battlefordsnow