Postcard from the trenches: Teachers miss you all, discussing things at length here! All the difficulties youre seeing in schools this week, many of you know your schools teachers have been trying to manage for years and will be managing now until the end of June. Thats why teachers have been seemingly quiet about the big issues until this year. Were not really very quiet (ahem) but are absorbed each year in giving what we can to students, to our own kids and your kids. Youll have noticed were not here as much now but were still here, just quieter again. But before quieting down... The giant fail in CCs determination to force a strike (as previously found in BC Supreme Court and proved again because it took her decision to end it) was suddenly teachers had the time, energy, and certainly the motivation to communicate fully, and to help make sure that everyone who cares knows whats going on. It gave us all, teachers and non-teachers alike, especially parents and students, time and energy and space to discover that our experience is shared experience, a set of problems we all face together. What follows may initially seem like a digression, but please bear with me. In the 1950s and 60s educator Myles Horton trained Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, Stokely Carmichael, Andrew Young, thousands directly and millions indirectly through the NAACP in how to actually achieve civil rights. He did not have, or claim to have all the answers. He believed in two things: that offering people some help and a space to share problems, they could figure out what their shared problems were; and secondly, with the same support, that they could figure out together what to do about them. And that, of course, is what the people named above and millions of others, did. Favourite anecdote. When Rosa Parks left her session at Hortons little HIghlander School in Tennessee, like every participant over the years she was asked what shed decided to do. She replied I dont know. Something. This FB page, others, and various other places in which people have met and discussed the issues, have helped everyone who cares about public education to realize what our shared problems are. In sum the BC Liberals have gutted the funding of BC public education since 2002, causing all sorts of problems today in providing adequate schools and service. We can debate the ideology driving it, but the numbers are clear. The situation is far worse than minus $1k per student compared to the Canadian average by the way. That number is from 2011. Funding has fallen much further since. #1 Problem: Failing to fund public education adequately is tearing it apart. #1 Solution: Widespread demand for change by BC citizens (never again merely taxpayers), refusing to accept No, is the evident answer. How? remains. Well obviously this is the fun part, the creative part, for parents, family, friends, and all supporters of public education. Seriously, on your block, for your school, in your neighbourhood and town: What are you going to do? No one can tell you. Its perfectly ok if the first reaction is I dont know. Its not necessary to start something alone, many things are being started that can be joined, or one could get some friends or neighbours together to talk it over. The important part, the hopeful and joyful and full-of-potential part for all of us, is that the last word is a determined Something. PS Am old enough to remember a bit of the 60s. Favourite all-time slogan from that time was Fighting for Peace is like F***ing for Virginity. Second favourite, not humourous but on the mark was from Malcolm X, who like all the others visited Highlander: If youre not part of the solution, youre part of the problem. MLK warned of the silence of our friends. The message is the same. We get what we earn. A couple of generations back, people had to give blood, and lives, in fear, for what we just have to stand up to keep. PPS To all who supported teachers through a very trying time, thank you so much. We share some hope now, our determination undimmed. Cheers!!
Posted on: Thu, 25 Sep 2014 07:06:47 +0000
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