Students in Squamish are finally feeling the impact of what has been, until recently, a relatively benign strike action.
At the beginning of the school year in September teachers across the province eliminated administrative tasks deemed "non?essential" from their agendas after several failed bargaining attempts with the Public School Employers Association. These tasks included writing report cards, attending staff meetings, and professional development not related directly to teaching. For most of the eight?month stint, aside from a three?day walkout in March, students in Squamish have been largely unaffected.
Things have taken a bit of a shift, though, since the passage of Bill 22 two months ago. Though the government proposed the bill as a regrouping period in which no strike action would be taken, the B.C. Teachers' Federation's immediate reaction was to escalate the situation. In protest, teachers withdrew their voluntary services, therefore eliminating many extracurricular activities from outside the regular timetable.
Some schools in the province had already taken this measure beforehand, but until now school life at Howe Sound Secondary had been continuing almost completely normally. Since the motion has been put into effect, however, the high school has had to pull the plug on various sports teams and even some of the arts programs have taken a hit.
Although some activities, such as rugby, hockey, and girls soccer, which were started before the escalation of the action, are still running, golf, track and field, and mountain biking have all been cancelled. In addition, the school's jazz band has had to move its final performance to fit within their class time and the drama class can only hold the evening performance of its final plays if their teacher is not involved, much to the disappointment of the entire drama class.
Principal Christine Perkins has stated that this year's dry graduation has not been impacted; however, the school's awards night has had to be cancelled.
Teachers emphasize that they are not standing in the way of any parent or excluded staff volunteers from running any of the programs or events. They are simply withdrawing their own services outside of class time. The justification is that they can now focus more exclusively on teaching their classes.
Other measures the BCTF are taking in opposition to Bill 22 include a media campaign to inform the public of their plight and work to make public education a vote-determining issue in the May 2013 election. They are aiming to elect a government that is more supportive of public education - a noble cause, for sure, but it doesn't do much for students during the final weeks of the 2011-'12 school year.
