“Education under attack!?! What do we do? Stand up fight back!” That was the message shouted last week during the provincial day of action against the Rae Review’s likely call for post secondary tuition hikes. The rallies in Toronto, Sudbury, and Windsor were organized by the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS).
Approximately a thousand students and workers from across Ontario gathered in Toronto last Thursday to protest the rising cost of postsecondary education. Demonstrators from schools in Ottawa, Mississauga, Hamilton, Peterborough, and Toronto arrived in front of U of T’s Convocation Hall to begin the march that led to the front steps of Queen’s Park.
One of the first to speak to the crowd was MPP and Ontario New Democratic Party leader Howard Hampton.
“We call for a ten per cent reduction, right off the bat,” he said. “Ontario cannot go on as the province that contributes, at a per capita basis, the least to postsecondary education. We’re last in Canada…. We’re down there at the bottom, even compared to some of the worst American states.”
Hampton and other speakers called on the Ontario Liberal Party to keep its campaign promises to cut tuition fees.
Tannis Bujaczek, a graduate student at Carleton University in Ottawa, went so far as to present Mary Anne Chambers, Ontario’s Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities, with a giant papier mâché “promise ring,” which the minister declined.
“Even if she didn’t take it with her, we still showed her the ring,” said Bujaczek. “We reminded her that students haven’t forgotten the promises that were made, and we do expect the Ontario Government to keep them in this term.”
Katie Mayerson, a Ryerson University student, simply hoped that someone was paying attention to the rally.
“I’m hoping that people are looking out their windows and seeing this and understanding that people are skipping classes that they paid for because this is really important to them,” said Mayerson.
Student leaders at U of T were pleased with the turnout, and some made reference to possible things to come. The CFS has discussed “a province-wide student strike” should the recommendations of the Rae Review be negative, said Sam Rahimi, the Student Adminsitrative Council’s VP External, who took on a central role in organizing the February 3 demonstration.
Rahimi also talked about a 26-page report that U of T’s Student Council submitted to the Rae Review Commission detailing “why reducing tuition fees and increasing funding makes economic sense.”
Paul Bretscher, president of U of T’s Arts and Sciences Students’ Union, called attention to the over $10 billion in Ontario student debts and then explained why he thought that the day’s rally was necessary, “It’s time that we bring this information forward to our elected officials and advocate for a public education system.”
