Summer 2020

It has been a memorable school year to say the least. I want to acknowledge all the important work done in our classrooms before the pandemic. Those days set us up to find success with our students during our emergency learning. I also want to applaud you all for the incredible work you completed as you supported and taught your students remotely. Nobody expected or was prepared for this occurrence. We demonstrated flexibility, empathy, and steadfastness. Our teaching practices have evolved because of the way we responded to our students over the last three and a half months.

As we begin our summer break, I feel like it is important for our membership to know that there will be work going on throughout the summer that will support home economics teachers upon their return to teaching in September. The BCTF is developing a government planning committee to work in tandem with the Ministry of Education. The goal of this committee is to develop more specific guidance that will allow for more consistency with respect to district approaches in specific areas so that the integrity of our programs can be maintained. Home economics will be represented on this committee and I expect to have documents developed specifically to support home economics educators. The committee will work in collaboration with local health authorities. BCTF President Teri Mooring assured me that individual teachers or LSAs do not need to produce individual safety plans on our own. The questions I will work hard to have the committee find answers to are listed here. My hope for us this summer is that we can all take some time to take care of ourselves. I hope that you can rest a little easier knowing that, although we don’t know exactly what September will bring, there is work being done to support us.

Although we are unsure about what our classes might look like in the Fall, one thing THESA is sure about is that we have an excellent conference planned for October 23rd. Although we believe meeting face to face provides invaluable opportunities, we think the virtual conference offers up some wonderful professional development opportunities as well. This conference will be our most accessible conference yet, reaching all corners of British Columbia and beyond! We can join together as we consider the theme “World as Home”. The conference will offer both hands-on and theoretical sessions by some incredible presenters. And we can’t wait to tell you about our keynote presenter. Stay tuned - we still have to finalize our plans. You can see our poster in this newsletter. Please visit thesaconference.ca to register (later this year) and view conference details as they progress.

The THESA executive met on June 20, 2020 and discussed our commitment to continuing to advocate for inclusive practices and pedagogy in home economics, including anti-racist and decoloninzing. This will be added to THESA’s “Objectives and Goals” at our AGM in October. You can read over the letter we drafted about this goal, find anti-racism resource recommendations (some home economics specific, some not), and also see how you can get involved in developing anti-racist resources for home economics teachers in this newsletter.

Lastly, if you are reading this newsletter and have not yet purchased a membership this year, please consider doing so. Strong membership helps support THESA to work for you and helps us to have a strong voice in the province and at the BCTF. Memberships can be purchased here at the BCTF website and is reimbursable through Pro-D funds in many districts.

I hope you have a relaxing summer break.

Melissa Edstrom

THESA President

Joe TongJune 29, 2020Presidents Letter

Summer 2020

Disclaimer: External Teaching Resources

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