‘Save our teachers’

KRHS students protest teacher reallocations

Madeline Hamill wants to know when the uncertainty will end.

“Post-secondary schools look for wellrounded students, but if cuts come to our school, they won’t be getting any,” said the Grade 11 Kinkora Regional High School (KRHS) student.

Hamill and about 90 other students protested outside the school from around 10 a.m. until lunchtime during their B block classes on Monday.

“We chose to do it now because this block is when a lot of our elective courses take place, and they are the courses that are being threatened by the cuts,” explained Grade 12 student Olivia Mullins.

Mullins is frustrated at the timing of the announcements made from the government.

“Students here won’t know what’s going to happen until after the summer. By then they will have already enrolled in courses and thought about what they want to do for the year. But what happens when it all gets undone? We just fought for months to stop the idea of school closures, and now we have to do it all over again.”

Recently, KRHS students and the school’s parents council learned that the school would be losing 3.5 teaching positions over the next three years. KRHS currently has about 124 students.

“We have 14 teachers at our school. Essentially we’ll be losing about 25 per cent of the staff,” said Hamill.

She added, “The government shouldn’t be making cuts to education because students are the future. Our electives will be lost and so will our extracurricular activities and sports teams.”

Hannah Larsen, Grade 12, said the protest was a way to speak for the teachers.

“They’ve been there for us. Now it’s our turn to be there for them. They do so much for the school, students and community, but they can’t do anything about this without getting in trouble.

“The one-size-fits-all theory that the government is using to decide what numbers are getting cut doesn’t fit here.”

Harrison Duffy, Grade 9, has three more years at KRHS. He’s worried the loss of elective courses and activities will cause students to go elsewhere and ultimately force the school to close.

“If we lose our agriculture, art, accounting and other electives available here, students are going to find it elsewhere. I think dropout rates from our school are going to go up. And eventually there will be no use in the school operating.”

Janet Payne and Deanna BassettGreenan, members of the parent council, watched with pride as students chanted “save our school”.

“It’s very frustrating. We fought all winter to be able to maintain our school, what we have and what we offer our students because our students do well here. And now we’re back fighting for something we don’t need to. Our numbers are up our enrolments are up,” said BassettGreenan.

“The students should be focusing on exams instead of having to be out here, even though it’s fantastic that they are standing up for what they believe.”

“Students here won’t know what’s going to happen until after the summer. By then they will have already enrolled in courses and thought about what they want to do for the year. But what happens when it all gets undone? We just fought for months to stop the idea of school closures, and now we have to do it all over again.” Olivia Mullins