Informed parents will understand the need for the limited strike launched by teachers this week even if it does affect them, say parents in the Burnaby school district.
“The ones that are there every day and interact with the staff and trust the principal and trust the staff and trust what they’re trying to do in the best interest of their child, they’re going to get it and they’re going to be OK with it,” Westridge Elementary parent advisory council member Stace Dayment told the NOW.
“The people that aren’t involved in their school, the people that aren’t there every day, that don’t know their teachers, that don’t know the staff, that don’t know the principal well, the ones that never go to PAC meetings and they don’t know what’s going on at their schools, it’s going to affect them and it’s going to piss them off.”
Starting today, teachers around the province will stop supervising students outside of class and stop meeting and communicating with principals except about safety issues.
The “low-level Stage 1 action” – as the B.C. Teachers’ Federation is calling the work-to-rule campaign – was announced at a press conference Friday, and Burnaby school district and union officials were quick to reassure parents that students wouldn’t be affected.
“It’s really focused on administrative issues only, and teaching and learning will continue in classrooms,” superintendent Kevin Kaardal told the NOW. “The major change that they’ll see in their schools is that at recess there will be management staff in most cases out supervising recess.”
But similar promises were made in September 2011, the last time teachers launched a work-to-rule campaign, and Dayment remembers that’s not how it turned out.
An American who had recently immigrated to B.C., Dayment’s first experience of Canadian education was when her daughter was enrolled in kindergarten just as teachers started their job action.
“They weren’t allowed to put handouts in the backpacks. They weren’t allowed to tell us anything about the PACs. They weren’t allowed to answer questions. They weren’t allowed to do report cards,” Dayment said. “We thought, ‘Man, this is what school’s like? This sucks!’ I hated those teachers. I was so mad. How dare they?”
But her perspective has changed completely since she started getting involved at her daughter’s school, she said.
“I feel like there’s this strange tug-of-war that’s the teachers fighting for the kids,” she said, “and I feel like the other side is the B.C. government trying to sabotage what the teachers do for a living.”
Dayment cited the Burnaby school district’s $3.1 million operating shortfall projected for next year and proposed cuts to elementary music teachers and teacher-librarians.
She said it’s unfair teachers have to risk angering parents to do the right thing for kids.
“It’s so unfair because they have so little weaponry that they’re able to use,” Dayment said. “There’s no artillery except for doing things that end up pissing off parents.”
Dayment’s sentiments were echoed by Jocelyn Schonekess, a Burnaby parent who has spent 15 years volunteering on school PACs, the District Parent Advisory Council and the B.C. Confederation of Parent Advisory Councils.
“My thoughts are that parents who are aware of the issues are very supportive of the teachers,” she told the NOW.
Ultimately parents and teachers are working toward the same goal, she said.
“As a parent who volunteers and sees first hand how hard the teachers and parent volunteers are working to support all the children, it is very frustrating to see the system degrading each year as costs to the district increase, and more and more pressure is put on parent groups to fundraise for the sporting equipment, books, music and arts supplies, new technology, field trips and playgrounds.”
