Hamilton school boards have no whistleblower protection policies

Hamilton's two largest school boards have no dedicated whistleblower protection policies - a gap experts and teachers say leaves employees afraid to speak out about wrongdoing and vulnerable if they do.

The public board says such a policy is in the works. The Catholic board says it won't rule out creating one.

The issue of non-existent whistleblower protections came to light last month when two Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (HWDSB) teachers spoke out after the board investigated them as a result of complaints lodged by trustee Carole Paikin Miller. Her complaints dealt with comments the teachers posted on social media about her support for a controversial police-in-schools program and allegations of racism.

Neither investigation resulted in findings of policy violations.

The HWDSB told The Spectator it agreed to create a whistleblowing policy at its June 7 board meeting. When the policy will be ready is unclear, but spokesperson Shawn McKillop said it will be developed throughout the 2021-22 school year.

While I'm pleased that the board has committed to creating a whistleblower policy, they also need to consider how they will handle complaints like this in the future so as to avoid unnecessary costs at the expense of our students," said Alice Smith, one of the two teachers investigated.

The cost of both investigations was nearly $25,000.

Smith added that the board's complicity in investigating people who are trying to call out racism or other injustices has the effect of silencing those who witness such injustices, and stifles much-needed changes that will benefit our most marginalized students."

It remains unclear what the public board's pending whistleblower policy might include.

When asked what protections are currently in place, McKillop pointed to a board fraud-prevention policy. The policy defines a whistleblower as: Anyone (including trustees, employees, volunteers, students, parents, external organizations and the general public) who reports suspicions of wrongdoing by trustees or employees of the board."

The Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board says it doesn't have a whistleblower policy, but it is in the process of reviewing our workplace harassment policy and would not preclude one coming about as a result of that."

Whistleblower-specific policies at both boards are long overdue, says David Hutton, a senior fellow with Ryerson University's Centre for Free Expression.

This is obviously pretty inadequate," Hutton said of the lack of existing protections. You'd certainly hope an organization of this size would have good policies in place, including whistleblowing."

Without such policies, wrongdoing can go unreported as people who might speak out fear reprisal, he said. Would-be whistleblowers feel silenced. Those who do speak out may face negative consequences, Hutton said.

Parsa Shahid, an HWDSB teacher and the mother of former student trustee Ahona Mehdi - whose allegations of racism levelled at board trustees prompted the board to conduct an $84,000 probe - says there exists a big culture of fear" at the board. She has been calling for a whistleblower policy in the hopes it might encourage more people to speak out when they see wrongdoing, including racism, and protect them from reprisal.

She questions why a policy doesn't already exist.

If you have nothing to hide, why are you so scared of this policy?"

She said that while teachers have unions supporting them, they need the extra guarantee from their employer that they will be protected.

Daryl Jerome, president of the local bargaining unit for the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation, said his unit is certainly looking forward to a whistleblower policy to protect our members who come forward with legitimate concerns."

The Hamilton board would be far from the first to make such a move. The Toronto District School Board has had a version of a whistleblower policy in place since 2008.

The Ministry of Education does not require boards to have whistleblower protection policies.

Katrina Clarke is a Hamilton-based reporter at The Spectator. Reach her via email: katrinaclarke@thespec.com