Accountability Doesn't End With Management

June 4, 2026

Dan Bernier

Commentary

The recent survey of Saskatchewan education support workers has sparked an important conversation about who should be responsible when untrained staff are asked to perform medical duties in schools.

The survey found that many support workers reported administering medications, using EpiPens, monitoring blood sugar levels, assisting with tube feeding, and carrying out other health-related procedures. Many also reported receiving little training or training that did not come from qualified medical professionals. That should concern everyone.

Children deserve safe, competent care. No parent should have to wonder whether the person assisting their child with a medical procedure has received proper training or understands what to do if something goes wrong.

What concerns me, however, is that the conversation appears to focus almost entirely on governments, school divisions, and administrators while largely ignoring another important question: Why did so many people agree to do work they believed they were not properly trained to perform?

To be clear, school divisions deserve scrutiny. If they assigned medical responsibilities without proper training, policies, or support, they should be held accountable. If governments have failed to provide sufficient healthcare resources within schools, they should also answer for that failure.

But accountability cannot stop there. Every worker has a responsibility to understand the limits of their qualifications. Every union member has the right to ask questions, seek clarification, document concerns, and refuse work they reasonably believe is unsafe or outside their training.

Good intentions are not a substitute for competence. Many support workers were likely trying to help children. Many were likely placed in difficult situations where there appeared to be no easy solution. But when a task involves medication or medical procedures, the stakes are too high to simply proceed because "that's how we've always done it" or because someone higher up expected it.

If a worker genuinely believed they lacked the training necessary to perform a medical duty safely, that concern should have been raised immediately. If the training was inadequate, it should have been challenged. If the responsibility exceeded the scope of the position, that issue should have been documented and addressed.

The fact that a system may be flawed does not eliminate individual responsibility within that system. The real lesson from this survey is not that support workers are villains. Nor is it that administrators alone are to blame.

The lesson is that accountability must exist at every level. Governments must ensure schools have adequate healthcare resources. School divisions must provide proper policies, training, and support. Unions must advocate for safe working conditions and clear boundaries. And employees must be willing to speak up when they believe something is unsafe or beyond their qualifications.

Children's safety is too important for responsibility to be passed around like a hot potato after the fact. If this survey reveals anything, it is that a culture of silence helps no one. Not the workers. Not the schools. And certainly not the students.

When children's health and safety are involved, everyone has a responsibility to do the right thing. And everyone should be accountable when they don't.