Thunder Bay Basic Education Schedule - Winter/Spring 2017

Learn and practice the skills necessary to meet with elected officials and deliver your message to them.  Face to face meetings with MPs, MPPs, and city counsellors are the most effective way of creating change.

By the end of this one-day course, participants will:

• Develop an understanding of the importance of lobbying as a means of influencing the political system;
• Practice lobbying skills through group roleplay.

Open to: All members

Prerequisite:  N/A

Talking Union Basics is an introductory, core course that has been designed to introduce members to their union and collective agreement.  It has been drafted with the following goals and objectives:

Goals

• have bargaining unit members knowledgeable about their union.
• initiate members’ interest in having their working conditions respected and improved upon in the workplace.
• create a union presence in the workplace.

Objectives

By the end of this course, participants will:

1.      know why workers need unions,

2.      understand the basic principles and values of the PSAC,

3.      know what the PSAC looks like, how it operates, how to participate and who to go to for information and help,

4.      know their basic rights and how to exercise their rights,

5.      understand their obligations as union members,

6.      be able to read, interpret and apply their collective agreement.

Open to: All members

Prerequisites

The major purpose of this course is to provide grievor’s union representatives with basic knowledge and skills to work with members and effectively process grievances at the initial stages of the grievance procedure and to mobilize them around workplace problems.

By the end of the course, participants will:

• Know what a grievance is and where the right to grieve comes from;
• Understand their legal and contractual rights and obligations as union representatives in the grievance process;
• Understand how the grievance process works;
• Know how to write a grievance,
• Be able to fully prepare for a grievance hearing;
• Be able to motivate and involve members in the grievance process;
• Be able to effectively present a grievance to management;
• Be able to prepare a grievance file that can be used at all stages of the grievance process.

Open to: Stewards, Local Executive members, local activists, health and safety committee members, all members

Prerequisite:  Talking Union Basics

This course gives local executive members who have already completed the Introduction to Local Officers training more training, and the two courses combined constitute an advanced course.  By the end of the course, participants will:

• Know what a local is and how it fits into the union
• Know how an effective local functions
• Understand the roles and responsibilities of the local executive
• Know how to work effectively as a team
• Be able to engage members in the local
• Be able to put democracy into action
• Know how to deal effectively with management

Open to: Local Executive members

Prerequisite:  Local Officers Training