College faculty strike barrels toward third week
Michael Harrison sat at home in Trenton on Wednesday.
The left ankle he busted playing hockey two weeks ago needs to heal.
Besides, the 18-year-old Conestoga College student wasn’t missing out on his firstyear power line technician courses at the Ingersoll campus. Their plug remains pulled as Day 11 of the provincewide college faculty strike arrives on Thursday.
A half-million students of 24 Ontario public colleges have the unwelcome option of putting their feet up with classes suspended.
“So far, it’s a lost cause for me,” Harrison said. “But also for my fellow classmates. If it goes past three weeks, the whole year is most likely going to be a lost cause.”
Week 3 of the strike by 12,000 members of the Ontario Public Service Union Employees Union, including 784 at Conestoga, seems a certainty.
The colleges are offering a 7.75-per cent raise over four years. However, the issues of precarious contract work and academic planning are divisive. As of Wednesday afternoon, no talks were imminent between the colleges and the union.
“We’re going to go into next week and we will not have a settlement,” Conestoga College president John Tibbits said. “That’s for sure, at this point.”
The College Student Alliance, which represents student unions at 16 colleges, can see that too. It’s planning a rally at Queen’s Park next Wednesday at 1 p.m.
Conestoga Students Inc. is posting signup lists for the rally and will provide buses to take frustrated students into Toronto to take part. Conestoga has 14,000 full-time students and 32,000 in continuing education. There could be a lot of interest in attending the rally.
A week from now may be an important moment in the faculty strike.
“That’s approaching more of the crucial point where students are a little bit more at risk of losing their time,” said Conestoga Students Inc. president Aimee Calma, who is also a director for the College Student Alliance.
“We want to make sure we’re putting as much pressure on as we can.”
A rally seemed to be the most appropriate statement the students union could make to attempt to prod both sides back to the bargaining table to negotiate.
“We respect the process,” Calma said. “It’s kind of the same stance the government is taking. We want to let it do its thing and play out. But at the same time, it’s frustrating that there’s no movement so we want to put pressure on them in this way.”
Conestoga is currently on a reading week.
No Ontario college student, both sides say, has ever lost a year in three past strikes over the last 50 years. The last strike came in 2006. It lasted three weeks.
“When we come back from study break, there’s seven more weeks to this semester,” OPSEU Local 237 president Lana-Lee Hardacre said on Wednesday.
“If we could get a mediator to agree to some dates with both sides, then we could all agree to come back. Like, you could come off strike. But digging in their heels to say the system isn’t broken is not helping us.”
Tibbits says there is no firm drop-dead date set for a settlement to save the year.
“We’re not at the real 11th hour,” Tibbits said.
But there will be a bigger squeezing effect on student schedules should the strike drag on.
“Obviously, the farther it goes, the more frustrating it is for students,” Calma said. “And the more they’re going to have to crunch when we do end up getting back into classes to get things moving.”
Meanwhile, Harrison is torn between resting his ankle and getting back to school, should the strike go beyond three weeks. That might be his drop-dead date.
“It really means nothing if we put out that $2,000 — or however much money we paid to be there — and aren’t getting the time,” Harrison said.
It’s frustrating that there’s no movement. AIMEE CALMA, CONESTOGA STUDENTS INC.