Education minister surprised Halton schools unlock doors as part of job action
Halton District School Board head says only front doors will remain open
Escarpment View Public School in Milton is one of those with a sign posted saying a door is temporarily unlocked and to enter and proceed directly directly to the office.
"Without any support it just fell on the secretary in the office who has 1,000 other ministry initiatives that have been downloaded on them and it just interrupts the day constantly," said Dean.
'No choice but to unlock doors'
"The directive was to unlock the front doors so when you unlock them for students to come in in the morning, they'd be unlocked until the end of the day," Stuart Miller, the director of the Halton District School Board, told CBC News.
Miller emphasized that only the front doors will remain unlocked while the others will remain locked all day, and that cameras outside all school entrances are still being monitored by school secretaries.
Sandals says parents are right to be worried about the situation, and she's concerned about the safety of students.
But the minister pointed out there is no mandatory, province-wide policy of keeping school doors locked.
Sandals says the Halton board did take advantage of provincial funding to install door locks and buzzer systems in its schools, and she doesn't know why answering the buzzer has become tied up in a labour protest.
"It's not acceptable that kids' safety should be used as a bargaining chip," said Wynne. "It absolutely is not."
School support staff represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees have been without a contract for more than a year, but Sandals says she's not even clear yet exactly which union is to blame for the unlocked doors.
With files from CBC News