Dear Parents,

While job action is always difficult, as a Parent Group our mandate is to support students and teachers at our school. While we may or may not agree with teachers’ job action, we can see the effects of budget cuts over the last years. As a middle-of-the-road PAC, our resources are being stretched thinner and thinner as we try to provide the things (library books, art supplies, gym equipment and computers) that in the past were a part of the government’s budget for schools.

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With this in mind, the Ross Road PAC is pleased to allow space on our website for Advocacy Ross Road* to present letters and links to articles about Job Action to help raise awareness and understanding of the issues, facts and impacts on public education in BC. Read on, stay informed!

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As we all know, the strength and health of our society depends to no small degree on the investment we place in public education. If we do not prepare for the future through quality education for all today, we will not be able to maintain our standard and quality of living tomorrow, when today’s students will be responsible for society as leaders, workers, teachers, thinkers and health care workers. What sort of society do we want our children to grow up in? What sort of society to we want to grow old in? That is the central issue!

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As the Hastings Elementary PAC chair has phrased it on the Hastings Elementary PAC website, this isn’t a union issue. It is a public education issue:

“It doesn’t matter whether or not you like unions, whether you voted Liberal, NDP, Green or didn’t vote at all. It doesn’t matter whether you live in East Kootenay or East Vancouver, or whether your child is in public school or private school, whether they are struggling or excelling, whether they are in pre-school or don’t go to school anymore. In fact it doesn’t matter whether you have a child at all. In the end, this is an issue that affects all of us.

The current disagreement between the teachers and the provincial government is just a symptom of a much larger problem.

Education is an issue that politicians from all sides of [the] political spectrum love to pay lip service to because it’s an easy way to ingratiate themselves with the voters. Everyone says they want to improve the education system because the students of today are going to be those in charge of the future. The reality is much more complicated. The problem for politicians is that putting money into public education doesn’t pay dividends for a decade or more. Politically, that’s a lifetime.”

—Tim Wearing
PAC Chair for Hastings Elementary
(>> Click here to read the full post)

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More information about Job Action, Bill 22 etc:
>> Click here for an extensive list of links to online posts, letters, reporting and commentary that attempt to shed light on the issue in various ways.

Get in touch with Advocacy Ross Road:
>> If you have any links you would like to share, or thoughts on the matter, please use the form below to get in touch with Advocacy Ross Road. We would appreciate input and insight from all concerned parents and citizens.

*About Advocacy Ross Road: This group of concerned Ross Road parents came together in March 2011 in response to education budget cuts, believing that a more active role is required to maintain and improve the education delivered to our students. Click here to read more about Advocacy Ross Road and the Spring 2011 Petition and Letter-Writing Campaign. The Ross Road PAC is most supportive of these efforts.