Students at a Lethbridge high school joined students from schools across Alberta in a walkout protesting the Alberta Government’s use of the notwithstanding clause and passing of Bill 2.
Sam Olsen organized the Lethbridge Collegiate Institute High School walkout to not just support Alberta teachers and pick up the mantle from where they left it, but also to build community and bring people together instead of there being a divide.
“This is not only just an attack on teachers, this is an attack on all workers,” Olsen says. “It is affecting everybody now and their ability to strike. Yeah, the main focus here is supporting teachers and helping be their voice alongside being my own voice and having a community and standing together in unity.”
He says that how the UCP Government said this is what students wanted was wrong and did not speak for her or other students, because there was no time given for Members of the Legislative Assembly to get input from the people that they represent, including the students. Olsen adds the students need to be able to have a bigger voice when it comes to these issues, because ultimately, the government’s choices are impacting them.
“I don’t think they spoke for us. I think this is blatantly untrue. What they’ve done by forcing teachers back to school without improving the class conditions and not allowing for class caps or class complexity caps is just negatively impacting us,” he says. “A very huge thing is that the teachers just don’t have enough time to talk to all the students. They don’t have time to connect with them and build relationships with them and allow them to get the help they need in the classroom and build up the skills that they need within that subject.”
According to the grade 11 student, he thinks the government’s promise of hiring 3,000 more teachers and 1,500 more educational assistants will make a difference, but it will not be enough to help fix the issues.
“What we need is a lot more schools, and of course, that takes time. Of course, that is a process we have to go through, but I’m not expecting it to happen now. I’m expecting them to act now, and I’m expecting them to use the position that they have in government to do better for the people that they represent.”
“This is something that we’re doing for the future, for the future children in the schools, for the future high school students, for the future of our country and for the future of our province and the students and the children that are the future.”
Nathan Svoboda is a concerned parent who says he is immensely proud of the students who are taking a stand and seeing the impact the government’s choices are making on their own lives, their future lives, and their families’ lives.
“Ultimately, laws like Bill 2 are threats made by the dominant socioeconomic group in a province, and these kids see that,” Svoboda says. “They’re choosing to stand with the rest of us workers, the rest of the people in this province who don’t want our charter rights trampled on.”
Olsen says that seeing his peers come together to stand up and support their teachers has brought back a lot of hope she had for the next generation.
“This is them saying this is them telling you that they’re here to stay and we’re here to fight for what we believe in as future voters, as students and as people who are the future of this province.”
According Olsen if he had the chance to speak to Premier Danielle Smith, the main statement would be to do better.
“You need to do a lot better for your students; what you are doing is not helping anybody. If you want to privatize education, if you want to make it worse for all the teachers and all the people that you represent. You can do that, but what are you getting out of that?”
Thursday was the second day in a row that students from the Lethbridge school walked out of class in protest of Bill 2 and the use of the notwithstanding clause.
On Monday, the UCP government passed the bill they called ‘The Back to School Act’, ultimately ending the 22-day-long Teacher Strike. The legislation also puts in a contract in place until 2018 that includes a 12 per cent salary increase over four years, additional market adjustments of up to 17 per cent for up to 95 per cent of teachers, and the hiring of an additional 3,000 teachers and 1,500 educational assistants. This is the same proposed contract that teachers voted on back in September and was rejected by 89.5 per cent of teachers.
