Grassroots groups battle for safer return to school
Parents demand smaller classes, improved COVID-19 safeguards
Grassroots organizations are popping up all over Alberta, writing letters, making phone calls and planning protests as they turn up the heat on the province for a safer return to school in September.
Over the past two weeks, the new grassroots organization “Wall of Alberta Moms and Dads” has gathered nearly 3,000 volunteers and conducted a “Phone Flashmob” this week.
Parents placed nearly 500 calls to the office of Education Minister Adriana Lagrange stating their concern over no new funding to reduce class sizes or increase safety around COVID-19 in schools this fall.
“We’ve just started to crank up the heat on this government, and we will target not just the education minister, but all MLAS,” said group spokesman David Gray.
“We will blast them on all channels, with more phone calls, more letters, through social media, and through parades and protests that are COVID safe.”
Gray, who says a protest is planned at the legislature Aug. 27, has heard from thousands of parents worried about their kids in crowded schools.
“The government has spent nothing, zero, on efforts to reduce class sizes. Our kids will be amplifiers of this virus, and we know the best way to reduce risk is to physically separate students.
“I’ve never been so livid with my government. I’m a conservative. I like my taxes low. But I like my kids alive, too.”
Gray said despite the efforts of hundreds of callers this week, none has received a response from the minister’s office.
Colin Aitchison, press secretary for Lagrange, said that while the province supports the right to free expression, he did not say whether the minister returned any of the calls, only adding that some callers were verbally abusive.
The UCP government has announced all K-12 schools can reopen classes in a return to normal scenario, with masks only being mandated in common areas or where physical distancing of at least two metres is not possible.
Last week, the province reportedly awarded a $4.2-million contract to Old Navy and IFR Workwear to supply two washable masks to each Alberta student and staff member.
But as school districts complain of underfunding, the UCP has maintained that schools have been provided enough to be safe and reduce class sizes.
Parents feel caught in the middle, fearing with so many classes still having more than 30 students in tight, poorly ventilated rooms, kids could face increased risk of contracting COVID -19 or bring the virus home to other, more vulnerable family members.
Dr. Katherine Bisby, a family physician in Calgary, is part of another grassroots movement called “Coalition for Safer AB Schools,” bringing together hundreds of parents, educators and several Alberta doctors and pediatricians concerned about the province’s back-to-school plan.
“There is a lot of evidence suggesting that physical distancing is a big part of minimizing the spread of this infection.
“Yet I am not seeing that addressed by this government, and that’s a real concern for me.”
Bisby said that as a doctor she has also heard from many patients who are fearful about the province’s back-to-school plan, and how the risk of COVID -19 will affect students, staff, their families and the surrounding community.
Madison Bashaw, a teacher with the RAD Educators Network who has also joined the Coalition for Safer AB Schools, said families feel like their voices are not being heard as they face a difficult and “impossible” decision for fall.
“Our children are the most important thing in the world and their safety is an immediate and urgent concern, so it’s really getting people fired up.”
Carla Davidson, spokeswoman for Project Safe September, says her group has sent more than 1,000 letters and emails to the education minister, but have only received form letter replies stating “thank you for your concern.”
Davidson, whose daughter attends an elementary school in southeast Calgary and had 52 students in her class last year, is worried there could be an equal amount this fall, even with the risk of COVID-19.
“I’m hearing a lot of concern from other moms in my neighbourhood,” said Bashaw, who has a background in vaccine and respiratory disease research.
“People are legitimately concerned about the potential impacts. Even as the government mandates mask wearing, it’s only in common areas.”
Gray, whose wife died of cancer this spring, says he, too, is deeply worried about his daughter this fall as she heads back to class at a public high school in Edmonton with more than 2,500 students.
“This government is hoping to just stay the course and think we are going to go away. But we are just getting started, because we know it will take a lot of advocacy to stop this idiocy.”