Teacher disciplinary panel will make history today

A professional disciplinary panel will assemble today to hear serious allegations against a Manitoba teacher.

The public hearing — a first-of-its-kind videoconference scheduled for 10 a.m. — will take place more than 18 months after the province launched a professional disciplinary system and teacher registry.

“In a hearing, it’s the teacher against me, basically,” said Noni Classen, Manitoba’s independent commissioner of teacher professional conduct.

Both parties are expected to make their respective arguments in front of a three-person panel consisting of one teacher, one non-teacher and one individual nominated by the Manitoba School Boards Association.

Classen and the teacher who is being investigated, Janice Wen Ying Ma, are entitled to have a lawyer represent them.

This case marks the first time members of the public have the opportunity to hear evidence in real time.

Observers had to apply to attend the proceedings, announced on March 19, by submitting an online form at least five business days in advance.

“I hope that the truth comes out — that’s what we’re after,” said Reg Klassen, a retired superintendent, grandfather and volunteer board member at a child advocacy centre based in Winnipeg.

Klassen also hopes to see steps taken to “look after the person that has been hurt and to look after the person, in a just way, that has done the hurting, and that that’s not twisted by peer pressure, public pressure or politics.”

Klassen wrote suspension letters in dozens of teacher investigations as part of the closed-door disciplinary process in place prior to Jan. 6, 2025.

Any disciplinary process “is only as good as the quality and the training of the people involved,” he said, noting the previous system proved challenging at times because school divisions had to “investigate their own.”

Regardless of the outcome of the hearing, Klassen said criticism is unavoidable and holistic review is necessary.

“It’s going to take a lot of tax dollar money, a lot of time, and we’re all interested in it because it’s the first,” he added.

The professional regulator recently organized an inaugural written hearing for teacher Joshua William Braaksma. No materials in that case have been released to date.

The commissioner suspended teaching certificates for Ma and Braaksma amid separate investigations.

The Canadian Centre for Child Protection issued a statement that described today’s hearing as “an important milestone along the road to greater transparency.”

Elizabeth Hammond said her team will be watching carefully to see how the first videoconference is conducted.

“For students who have been victimized, or for parents who may want to report concerning behaviours, this public process is an important step toward building confidence in this still relatively new system,” said the centre’s new director of education — a role held by Classen before she was appointed commissioner in May.

Bobbi Taillefer, an experienced teachers’ union executive who was tapped to oversee the rollout of the registry, abruptly left the position in the spring. Her departure was announced after questions were raised about whether she’d been working remotely in Florida over the winter.

The former Progressive Conservative education minister who introduced legislation to create the new system before the 2023 election called its launch “relatively sloppy.”

Wayne Ewasko said he doesn’t have a time machine or crystal ball but the Tory education critic said he suspects things would be moving along faster if there hadn’t been turnover in the commissioner’s office.

Ewasko noted the first public hearing is taking place “18 months-plus” after the registry launched and more than three years after its legislation received royal assent.

He endorsed Classen’s appointment as overdue, citing the fact she has experience undertaking third-party investigations and distance from both the provincial school boards association and the teachers union.

Classen has ordered a publication ban to protect “Student A,” the minor involved in the allegations against Ma that will be heard.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca