TEACHERS WALK OUT ON FEBRUARY 21

On Friday, February 21, elementary and secondary teachers and education workers represented by the four major education unions in Ontario will stand up to the Ford government’s education cuts by participating in a one-day walkout across the province.

Members of the Association des enseignantes et des enseignants franco-ontariens (AEFO), the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO), the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association (OECTA) and the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation (OSSTF/FEESO) will all strike stand together on the picket lines across the province.

This is the first time since the political protest of 1997 that teachers and education workers from Ontario’s main education affiliates will all be out of their classrooms on the same day. Nearly 200,000 teachers and education workers will strike across 72 school boards, affecting nearly 5,000 schools across the province in protest of the government funding cuts to education.

“Educators in every school board will not stay silent as the Ford government proceeds to decimate our publicly funded education system,” says ETFO President Sam Hammond. “Our unions and members helped build Ontario’s world-class education system. By not seriously addressing the issues critical to students and student learning, the Ford government has made a sham of contract talks over the last seven months.”

“It is now evident that the Ford government’s agenda is entirely ideological and not at all concerned with providing quality education,” says OSSTF/FEESO President Harvey Bischof. “They are pulling resources out of the public education system and, with schemes like mandatory e-learning, laying the groundwork for private interests to profit from our students’ education. We are heartened that so many parents are standing with us against the dismantling of Ontario’s public education system.”

All four major teachers’ unions have been without contracts since August 31, and are all engaged in some form of job action.

Individual school boards across the province are still subject to rotating walkouts.