# 2016-152 - Promotion, Second Official Language Competency, Selection Board

Case Summary

F&R Date: 2016–12–12

The grievor submitted that the Promotion Selection Board's miscalculation of the points to be awarded for her second official language (SOL) profile resulted in her being incorrectly positioned on the annual Promotion Selection List and adversely affected her opportunity for promotion. The grievor maintained that although only one component of her SOL testing had expired, the scoring matrix penalized her as if she had two expired components. As redress, the grievor requested that her score and merit standing be reviewed and if appropriate, she be promoted retroactively.

The Initial Authority (IA) found that although the grievor's SOL score was initially incorrect, it had been appropriately corrected via secretarial resolution. The IA confirmed that this had resulted in the grievor moving up on the Promotion Selection List, however, she was not high enough to be eligible for promotion. The IA concluded that the grievor had been treated fairly and denied the grievance.

The Committee was satisfied that the grievor had notice of the importance placed on SOL competency in the Canadian Armed Forces. The Committee was further satisfied that the grievor knew or should reasonably have known that the onus was on her to keep her SOL evaluation up to date. Upon review, the Committee found that the grievor's SOL score was correctly awarded, via secretarial amendment, and that she was given all due consideration for merit list ranking. The Committee found it unfortunate that the grievor had failed to update her SOL profile prior to the Selection Board proceedings as this was the reason that she had not been promoted to date. Accordingly, the Committee recommended that the grievance be denied.

FA Decision Summary

The FA agreed with the Committee's findings and recommendation that the grievance be denied. The FA agreed that it was clear that the grievor was responsible for maintaining her second language profile and that she had not kept it up to date. He also found that the secretarial amendment had correctly scored her profile in accordance with policy. He explained that since the new policy was implemented in 2010, the three competencies of Reading, Writing, and Oral Expression are no longer scored separately; instead the profile is scored as a whole. The grievor's profile as a whole was not complete due to the expiration of her reading comprehension score. The matrix therefore allocated her only 1 point per board member for her oral proficiency and no points for her written comprehension. The FA recognized that this might seem harsh, but noted that this policy had successfully been in place since 2010 and that he saw no reason to update it.