Jun 20, 2022 at 2:17 pm
School Trustee 73 - TEA1
Kamloops and District Labour Council asks:
Do you think education should be treated as an essential service?
Candidate Answers
If by "essential service," you mean "should teachers be allowed to strike or not?" Then the answer is yes, they should be able to continue to strike. Striking is one of the few times employers actually listen to employees (albeit, not by choice).
While teachers absolutely are essential, if we bar teacher strikes then we may end up in a situation similar to what's happening in the US - low salaries and (good) teachers quitting!
Education is absolutely an essential service. Parents, students, teachers and administration experienced the impacts on the Education system through COVID 19 and students are suffering from the pressure to 'catch up.'
Having said that, if the intent of the question is to determine whether I believe that teachers should be enabled to strike, then I would suggest that any labour movement should be able to stand up for their rights as workers by the legal means provided to them. When work environments are not acceptable and pay increases don't maintain pace with the cost of living, there should be ways to enable workers to express their discontent.
When I think about an essential service, I think "basic public needs." I absolutely believe that education is an essential service. Every child has the right to an education.
100%.
An "essential service" in my eyes is something that needed to keep basic society functioning. So yes, we must without a doubt treat education as an essential service.
Absolutely! As an affordable education for all our students will be a huge positive benefit for our future.
Education is a fundamental right, which makes it an essential service. An extended interruption in a students educational experience would have implications in terms of learning loss and the loss of potential earnings if graduation was delayed. This does however, result in a decrease in leverage for negotiations for a primarily female workforce which results in it's own set of inequities.
Yes, education is absolutely an essential service for students.
However, equally essential is the ability to strike for teachers. I have many friends who are teachers and I understand how crucial strikes can be for providing fair and equitable negotiations so I would not want to strip teachers and their unions of that right.
absolutely!! not only it should be treated as an essential service, affordable education including university should be a human right. Not one child should be kept from getting higher education because of money. That's the only way for less fortunate Canadians to get ahead in life.
Education is an essential service and I have been proud to advocate on behalf of that statement throughout our region and province.
It remains one of the best investments for our society—both tangibly and intangibly—correlating with measurable reductions in crime, poverty, and disease while subsequently being shown to increase productivity, health, income/tax revenue, and civic engagement.
Education is without exception an essential service for a country that is planning for the generations to come, invested in its youth, and hopeful for its future.
Education is a fundamental right that should be accessible and affordable.