Members and supporters of CUPE Ontario demonstrate outside the legislative building at Queen’s Park in Toronto on November 4, 2022. Cole Burston/The Canadian Press
Ontario parents are once again faced with having children at home throughout the workday as the impact of labor strife in Ontario schools threatens to spill over into other sectors, including an already strained health care system.
The Ontario government’s decision to invoke the independence clause to deny the right to strike to 55,000 early childhood educators, custodians and other support staff in Ontario’s public schools has prompted workers to walk off the job across the province, closing schools in many places and leaving families struggling to arrange childcare.
School boards across the province have taken a number of approaches to the disruption that began Friday as education workers who are part of the Ontario Council of Unions of the Canadian Union of Public Employees walked off the job, a situation expected to last until Monday and possibly longer.
In some councils, some schools remain open. In other boards, asynchronous learning (where students work independently on assignments) is the rule, while elsewhere synchronous learning (where students attend a digital classroom all day) is mandatory.
For many families forced to look after their children at home, the thought of returning to conditions similar to the mandatory school closures during the pandemic was met with horror.
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Kaylan Lindsay of Lindsay, Ontario, has a daughter in Grade 3 at Trillium Lakelands District School Board French Immersion School and two baby twins at home. He says he’s had a blast with online learning.
“It doesn’t work for our family schedule. This causes us far more stress than it helps, and our daughter does not do well with online learning; she doesn’t seem to absorb it well,” she said.
She also worries that engaging in digital learning is akin to engaging in strike-breaking.
“It’s almost like crossing the line and I don’t think teachers should be forced to teach online and cross that line,” Ms Lindsay said. “Do not use the online tools we developed in a state of need to revoke the rights of CUPE members.”
For essential workers in the health care system, work must continue, in some cases adding stress to an already strained system.
Barbara McCully, vice-president of communications at Sinai Health in Toronto, said the hospital system is already struggling with staff absences due to illness. In an email to staff, Sinai Health said it recognizes that the school suspension will present challenges for parents of school-aged children and suggested changing shifts or working with administrators to find other arrangements to allow them to continue working . The hospital also offered contacts for an emergency nursery.
“Hopefully our staff who are supposed to be at the hospital have plans in place and we’ll just have to monitor it,” Ms McCulley said. “We have been moving staff throughout the pandemic to ensure we have coverage on our hospital units and will continue to do so.”
Ms McCully said Sinai weathered the first day of the work stoppage on Friday without any major problems due to the school closures.
“Depending on how long this can go on, I’m sure it will be a challenge for our staff,” she said.
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Angela Preokanin, first vice-president of the Ontario Nurses Association, said the situation in many Ontario health care facilities is already difficult as nurses deal with burnout, illness and staff shortages. But nurses are used to caring for their children on short notice, she said.
“There are problems, there are challenges, but it’s not going to make anything worse,” Ms. Preokanin said. “It will remain the same status quo that we have endured for the past two-plus years.”
The Toronto Transit Commission said it is monitoring the situation and will mitigate workforce issues and any impact on service as much as possible if they occur. Large employers, such as TD Bank, have asked managers to accommodate employees as best they can and encouraged flexible work arrangements whenever possible.
Some businesses and community organizations offer to help parents deal with the chaos by offering pop-up day camps of varying lengths. Ryan Shields runs Prodigy Martial Arts, a karate dojo in Mississauga, and he’s running a one-day “kicking camp” on Monday to help Peel County School Board parents bridge the gap between when kids will transition from asynchronous learning to being required to be online from tuesday.
“We’ve done strike camps before – before COVID – when teachers were on strike over online learning,” said Mr Shields, who will open the classes to both existing and new students looking to program. “I’ve had quite a few parents ask me if I can set this up. … They want their kids to do something,” he said.
Mr Shields is also a parent with a 14-year-old at Halton District School Board, which is offering a mix of classroom and home learning for the next week. His wife, who often helps him with the dojo, will have to come home at least half the week.
“I think both sides need to find a solution together. They’re both stubborn,” said Mr. Shields, who says most parents he’s spoken to are angry about the whole situation, including the failure of schools to plan ahead. “It’s no different than COVID, everything was last minute and they didn’t make any plans. Students want answers, teachers have nothing to give.”
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