‘Predatory teachers’ targeting First Nations

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This article was published 07/11/2015 (3602 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Indigenous educator Jamie Wilson calls them predatory teachers — they prey on remote northern reserves desperate for teachers but short of resources to check out their backgrounds.

Teachers are in dire shortage at remote reserves lacking the time to perform due diligence on qualifications, references, past employment, criminal and sex-abuse registry checks, said Wilson, Manitoba’s treaty relations commissioner and former education director at Opaskweeyak Cree Nation.

“Sadly, it’s not uncommon,” said Wilson. Wilson hasn’t met Alexander Saikaley, whom Oxford House First Nation fired as a school principal for cause in 2013 and whose resumé falsified his employment record, making no mention two remote First Nations schools in Quebec had previously fired him.

Saikaley has landed on his feet as principal of tiny Martin McKay Memorial School at Sachigo Lake, 425 kilometres north of Sioux Lookout, where Windigo Education Authority officials are now looking into his background but are vague about what they knew about Saikaley before hiring him.

“I can guarantee there’s people doing what he’s doing all over the north,” Wilson said. “They prey on schools.

“There’s a group, you can almost call them predatory teachers. They go to a community in crisis; they bounce around, even if they only stay three months,” Wilson said. “It’s really hard to put in due diligence” because of understaffing, a lack of resources and political interference in the operation of some tiny, remote schools.

“Funding is the main problem in the north, but it’s also that there are no laws governing education,” Wilson said. “To me, it demonstrates the need for an amalgamated First Nations school division, where they can pool their resources.”

Not enough resources available

Lorne Keeper, executive director of the Manitoba First Nations Education Resource Centre, pleaded for Ottawa to provide the resources for reserve schools to do their jobs the way public schools take for granted.

“The primary issue lies in the capacity of the individual community. In many communities, the community does a good job in recruiting and retaining teachers. These communities are the larger-populated. The occurrence of the type of scenario in Oxford House happens on occasion. If an education authority has the proper resourcing to manage HR at the local level, these type of scenarios occurring would likely happen less. The key to unforeseen incidents is for the communities to be properly funded for their school systems,” Keeper said.

Said Delores Daniels, the resource centre’s manager of human resources: “From the experience working with Oxford House, I can see that there is not enough resources available in the community to ensure recruitment and selection activities.

“I’m sure things like reference checks may not be done, either, and if they indeed request the verification of qualifications and criminal record or child-abuse checks,” Daniels said. “I know most reserves do not have funding to train and hire human resources people… to hire consultants in HR to do this work, that probably would cost a lot, too.”

Even a large and well-run school system such as OCN’s can fall prey, though not for long.

Wilson said one year, a newly hired teacher didn’t show up, but he had an impressive resumé handy of a woman who could start right away. But when Wilson did his due diligence, it turned out the woman wasn’t really a teacher.

As she was escorted off the property, the woman explained she’d made up her CV because she needed a job so badly.

“Three months later, I got a call from Saskatchewan. She used me for a reference,” Wilson laughed wryly.

Falsified records

In his experience in reserve schools, Windigo program director Charles Meekis said from Soiux Lookout, “We had a couple of principals who were quite problematic… I don’t know whether it’s a lack of due diligence for some communities.”

James Chapman, education director at Sachigo Lake, acknowledged that, “Falsified records, we run across them from time to time.”

Both educators said they check out the Ontario College of Teachers website before hiring any teacher. The college shows Saikaley is certified and in good standing.

Meekis said his predecessor had been involved in hiring Saikaley. Meekis was unaware what is in Saikaley’s resumé, and in fact has yet to meet him, given how remote Sachigo Lake is.

Chapman declined to say what is in the resumé Saikaley presented to the Windigo Education Authority. Since being contacted by the Free Press, “I asked him what the problem was. He gave an explanation (for leaving Oxford House) — he didn’t mention the court case,” Chapman said.

“We’ll probably go a little further with that. It takes time to look at it — we can’t do it overnight,” Chapman said. “We go through the process of the teachers college, we check out the most recent places of work.”

No school board “should tolerate an individual who has lied on their resumé,” said Barbara Bowes, president of Winnipeg-based Legacy Bowes Group, an expert in human resources and a leading management recruiter. “After all, what we are trying to teach children is high moral values. We want individuals who are trustworthy. How can you trust someone who lies on their resumé? What else are they lying about?

It’s not uncommon, said Bowes. “Communities often don’t have the resources to search out and verify candidate credentials.”

The case of Alexander Saikaley

When Oxford House First Nation hired Alexander Saikaley as school principal in 2011, the community was unaware his resumé did not mention two First Nations schools in remote areas of Quebec had previously fired him, and his claim of having worked for one of Ontario’s largest school districts was false.

Oxford House, 950 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg, fired Saikaley in 2013 before the school year ended.

Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Deborah McCawley wrote in rejecting Saikaley’s lawsuit against the band, Saikaley “had been dishonest in his resumé and had misled the board as to his work experience to such an extent that, had the board been aware of the material misrepresentations made by him, they would not have hired him in the first place.”

“The evidence disclosed that Mr. Saikaley lied several times in his resumé,” she wrote.

The judge ruled the band was justified in firing Saikaley: he ignored orders from his board not to raffle off a car; there were incidents in which a student caught with drug paraphernalia within the school was not immediately suspended; and another in which a suspended student was allowed to take a field trip. And he regularly refused to communicate with and take direction from his school board.

Those actions “demonstrate an unwillingness to abide by the rules and constitutes wilful disobedience and insubordination in law. These acts alone gave the board just cause for dismissal,” McCawley said.

The judge got it all wrong, a defiant Saikaley said in a telephone interview.

Where he worked before and why he left are nobody’s business, said Saikaley, who insisted job-seekers are not compelled to disclose information that would be prejudicial to their being hired. “They’re not entitled to prejudicial information. You don’t have to list every job you’ve had in your life.” he said.

What matters, Saikaley insisted, are his qualifications, his student graduation records and his ability to teach the curriculum.

“The judge is in error of the facts,” said Saikaley, who represented himself in court and who will appeal. “The judge is in error of how she interpreted the evidence.

“It’s not time to write the story — you don’t have all the information,” Saikaley said several times.

Saikaley said there is considerable mismanagement in First Nations schools, but the only protection teachers have is through the courts.

“This is not about First Nations, it’s about labour matters in a non-union environment,” he said. “You know, retention of staff is a big issue in all these communities. I could write my own article, I could write my own thesis,” said Saikaley, who said he is an accomplished researcher, as well as owning a ranch and holding a wide range of investments and properties. He once ran for mayor of Ottawa.

Reserve schools have no human resources departments and no grievance process, he said. “There is mismanagement, to the point that people under one-year contracts are marginalized. They can dictate at whim. What does that leave an individual — simple, it’s the courts.”

Saikaley said his time at Oxford House is on his resumé, but would not say what else is on his CV, or whether he mentions why he left Oxford House.

In Oxford House, former education director Alvin Grieves — who hired Saikaley and testified before McCawley — said he is not authorized to speak to the media.

Inquiries were referred to school board chairman Timothy Muskego, who said Grieves’s departure had nothing to do with Saikaley’s time at the school.

Muskego was not involved with the education authority at the time it hired Saikaley, and has no idea what due diligence may have been done checking out his CV. Muskego said there have been no calls to Oxford House from any prospective employers asking about Saikaley or his work experience there.

Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Deborah McCawley’s ruling can be read at http://wfp.to/IaQ