John Horgan stands with children on playground. Photo: Province of British Columbia/Flickr

Dear Premier John Horgan,

Because we believed you when you told us during the 2017 election campaign that you were committed to supporting all students in public schools, dozens of us spent hundreds of hours canvassing for your candidates in the nine ridings that fall within our school district. We moved making calls on behalf of your candidates to the top of our priority lists, above the myriad tasks we normally have as parents and as teachers.

We were highly motivated to do this because we could not bear the thought of yet another year of inadequate resources and overcrowded classrooms, yet another year of looking into the faces of our students who struggled to learn without the supports they desperately needed in their classrooms.  

Before 2002 when our collective agreement was shredded by the BC Liberals, students in Surrey who needed help with their learning, whether they were designated or not, had access to resource rooms and tutorial rooms. There were also enough Learning Assistant Teachers and Education Assistants to support all students who needed it.

As you well know, almost all of that support disappeared during the 16 years that the BC Liberal government was in power.

And so, while we knocked on doors and spoke to voters in spring 2017, we hoped that, if an NDP government were in place, the level of support needed for our students would, at the very least, be restored to what it had been in 2001, the year before the BC Liberal government gutted funding.  

On election night, we were thrilled when six out of the nine ridings in Surrey were won by your colleagues. We were especially ecstatic about the ousting of the former Minister of Education, Peter Fassbender, who had been deaf to our multiple appeals for support on behalf of our students. By the end of the school year in June 2017, we excitedly anticipated that our students’ suffering was time-limited, that there was light on the horizon.

There was indeed some light in the new school year. Your government announced more funding for a new school in our district where students had been subjected to gross overcrowding for too many years. We also happily welcomed all the newly hired teachers and looked forward to the relief they would bring to our schools. 

But now, it’s a been a year since your Minister of Education said that it was an urgent issue to restore supports and funding to our schools and we are distressed that the situation for students with special needs in our district has gotten worse than it ever was under the BC Liberals!

We are shocked that your government has allowed BCPSEA to avoid fully implementing our restored language.

We are deeply disturbed by the number of students who are left without supports daily while their Learning Specialist Teachers are called to cover classes because of a shortage of teachers. 

We are dismayed by the number of teachers who have had no prep time for weeks because they’ve had to cover other classes.

And we are extremely perplexed by your government not doing all that it can to honour the Memorandum of Agreement, the document that is meant to guide the restoration of what was lost in 2002. 

Why are you not pressuring all stakeholders to take the actions necessary to remedy the situation in schools, not exacerbate it by preparing to monetize the lost hours of support that too many students endured for far too long?   

Even in our worst nightmares we never thought we’d have to debate the morally repugnant issue of “cash for kids” with your government.

But here we are.

Where do we go next, Premier?

Sincerely,

Voters who teach in Surrey.

Photo: Province of British Columbia/Flickr

Like this article? Please chip in to keep stories like these coming.