The rotating school closures will begin across B.C. school districts on Monday as teachers start job action. Now one high school student is speaking out on how the dispute affects his peers in public schools.
Levi Chapman is a Grade 12 student and the co-student council president at Elgin Park Secondary School in South Surrey.
"For the older students, they realize the impact that it’s going to have, if it is not resolved," Chapman told CTV News.
"It's going to lead to potentially a lock-out,” he said. “Potentially teachers not being able to give us final grades. Whether it leads to something that affects our commencement or graduation, it could come to something like that."
In the past twenty years there have only been two negotiated settlements in B.C. Chapman said most students sympathize with teachers to some degree, but he wonders what could happen if the dispute is not settled.
"I think they really have to realize they're not just fighting against each other,” he said. “The students are right in the middle. The students are the ones who are going to suffer. Whether it’s smaller class size they need, whether it’s increasing pay, this negotiation has to come to a close."
BC Teacher’s Federation president Jim Iker was adamant that the teacher’s union would not back down.
"The government's recent antagonistic behaviour makes it clear, that it's time to take a strong stand," he said on Friday.
Recently B.C. Premier Christy Clark also weighed in, saying the imminent strikes will not aid in a resolution.
"Job action, putting kids in the middle of this? That isn't going to help," she said.
Chapman, who is in the midst of choosing his fall courses at the University of British Columbia, would like to see a student representative as part of the mediation team. Then both teachers and government could better understand how the long-standing dispute affects the students.
"The students are actually involved in this fight,” Chapman said. “It’s not just a two-party argument."
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Peter Grainger
