Students on year- round learning could lose as much as six weeks
Students at B. C. schools that are on a balanced or year- round schedule could lose between four and six weeks of classes if the strike by the BCTF goes ahead as planned on Tuesday.
At Garden City elementary in Richmond, for instance, all 255 students from kindergarten to Grade 7 would normally continue in school for another two weeks in July. This year, that would have meant staying in school until July 15.
Grace Cheng, co- chair of the school’s Parent Advisory Council, said the students are upset by what’s happening.
“Already, we have had to miss the district track meet, which was cancelled,” she said.
“The school talent show was cancelled. Right now, we have the school principal and volunteer ( PAC) parents giving the Grade 7 students an impromptu ceremony to give them closure.
“We’re trying to lessen the disappointment. The children are very upset because they’re missing out on a lot of things toward the end of the school year.”
Students will also be unable to complete the Kilometre Club, she said, a program that encourages healthy living by rewarding students for running around the school at recess and lunch.
At Garden City, students and staff take a three- week break in winter and spring and a shorter summer holiday. That was done to reduce absenteeism, Cheng said, among the 50 per cent of students who would often miss classes because they were travelling overseas to visit their family.
“If this is the last day of school for the rest for the year” Cheng said Friday, “we’ll be missing … possibly four weeks of school if the strike continues into July. That has had a tremendous impact on our calendar.”
Cheng has two students in the school: one is in kindergarten, the other in Grade 5. Cheng said she is a working parent who took the day off to help close the school for the summer.
“What it means for me is that like all working parents, we’re scrambling to find alternate child care in the coming weeks,” she said.
“We don’t know whether the school year is ending today or whether the negotiations will succeed. Many, many parents are upset at not knowing and not having a voice. It’s between two sides right now — the students and parents and families are being caught in between.”
Parents at Garden City, she said, love the administrators, teachers and custodians.
“We realize it’s their right to strike,” she said.
“We’re not happy about it but that’s the way things are. We’re not going to upset them by walking past the picket line to tie up loose ends in the school.”
According to the ministry of education, there are five schools in B. C. that operate on a year- round calendar and teach kindergarten- to- Grade 12 students.
They are Spul’u’kwuks elementary and Garden City in Richmond, Douglas Park Community ( elementary) in Langley, Kanaka Creek elementary in Maple Ridge and Cataline elementary in Cariboo-Chilcotin.
Mark Thiessen, district superintendent in Cariboo- Chilcotin, said his district has 28 students in a balanced calendar program at Cataline in Williams Lake. Their school year would normally continue to July 24.
“We’re saying to all of our students they should take their belongings home,” he said.
“We’re hopeful that a settlement can reached, but we’re having them take their supplies home. If they have a chance to come back, then hopefully they’ll be back.”
The students at Cataline are in two classes: kindergarten to Grade 2, and Grades 3 to 6.
He said the schedule allows for a longer break at Christmas and from the middle of April to the middle of May. The change accommodates students whose parents are in the logging industry, which shuts down during spring breakup when warmer weather turns logging roads soggy and impassable.