Saskatoon students are walking out tomorrow afternoon (Tues) in support of teachers and in protest of what the student organizing committee calls the provincial government’s inability to reach an agreement with the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation, “and hesitation to invest in the long-term future of education meaningfully.”

The walkout was organized by student council co-presidents from multiple high schools in both the public and Catholic school divisions. There will also be a protest in front of Sask Party MLA Don Morgan’s office beginning at 12:30 tomorrow afternoon on Taylor Street East. One of the organizers, Abbie Shynkaruk, says, “”As students, we hope that this protest highlights the concerns of students in Saskatoon and shows the public and government that students are not a passive presence in the discourse surrounding their education.”

The committee stresses that students understand the importance of attending class and do not take missing school lightly, but they believe the impact of the walkout and protest will draw significant attention to their cause and outweigh the missed instructional time.

Students from Marion M. Graham Collegiate developed the plan for a city-wide walkout, and then the idea spread to other schools across the city. There is also an online presence on Instagram: @studentswalkoutstoon

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Separately, there are a couple of different things happening with members of the Saskatchewan Teachers Federation this week. This includes a provincewide withdrawal of extracurricular activities lasting through Thursday, heading into the Easter break, and there’s a rotating withdrawal of noon-hour supervision by six local teachers’ associations. This affects all the schools in the Holy Family Catholic, Holy Trinity Catholic, North East, Prairie Spirit, Saskatchewan Rivers, Prince Albert Catholic, Living Sky and Light of Christ divisions, and Sakewew High School in North Battleford.

STF President Samantha Becotte says teachers have been making it clear for weeks that job action would escalate if the government continued to refuse to negotiate or agree to binding arbitration on class size and complexity.