Strike-Proof Alberta Students
The Alberta Teachers’ Association (ATA) has voted once again to proceed towards a teacher strike.
A neutral mediator had proposed a 3% pay increase retroactive to September 1st, 2024, another 3% increase on September 1st of this year, and another 3% increase in 2026.
She also proposed more generous sick leave, group health benefits, northern and remote allowances, and so on.
The mediator even proposed that each school division be required to establish a “Complexity and Inclusion Working Group” to address local class size and complexity concerns.
This proposal was rejected by the ATA and then they ratified their intention to strike.
Indeed, with most teachers in Alberta required by law to join and pay dues to the ATA, whether they'd like to or not, the ATA has every incentive to occasionally threaten or carry out strike actions.
Because there is no free market in teaching services, there is no way to find the correct wages for a teacher without the blunt instruments of strikes and threats of strikes, holding student learning hostage.
Not that this guarantees that teachers get what they deserve, either, since the government also has a very blunt instrument: they can legislate teachers back to work.
So, we have a system that ensures nothing like fairness, but does ensure families with kids in school, who don't get a seat at the table, are held in the balance from time to time.
And let's be clear, the cost to families and their students is substantial!
Studies of the impact of teacher strikes have found that they:
- lower immediate test scores,
- increase absenteeism,
- reduce the life-long education students attempt to receive,
- harm life-long earnings for students, and
- hurt immediate earnings for the family of the student.
School closures during COVID-19 were, at some times and places, difficult to distinguish from teacher strikes (including even some demands to abolish charter schools before teachers returned to the classroom).
Sure enough, a flurry of research all over the world confirms the same harms applied in these recent school stoppages, as well.
The major difference in a teacher strike is that they are unlikely to offer remote schooling (for the little good that did).
If a student's school is closed, the money should follow that child to any education their family chooses to fill the gaps!
Then their school would have an incentive to cater to the needs of the families who actually pay the salaries under dispute and entrust our most precious children to their supervision.
Importantly, the government would also lack a perverse incentive to keep wages down and endure occasional strikes, in which they don't spend money educating your kid.
Instead of being caught in the crossfire of regular labour disputes they are not a party to, families and their students should have an Education Continuity Allowance.
These could be used towards a school that is open and willing to take the child, tutoring, temporary home education materials, an online course, hands-on training in a profession, or any combination of these.
With the money that would already be spent on a given child, families should decide how best to replace the education opportunity torn away from the child by squabbling adults!
We're calling on the Government of Alberta to strike-proof Alberta students by introducing an Education Continuity Allowance.
If you agree, sign our petition to Strike-Proof Alberta Students today!
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