Alberta Teacher Strike Musings

Teachers in Alberta were on strike for 22 days. Then, we were ordered back to work and stripped of our rights to association and negotiation. The MAGA adjacent provincial government decided to invoke a rarely used clause in the Canadian Constitution called the notwithstanding clause. It allows provinces and the federal government to curtail constitutional rights if deemed absolutely necessary. It is rarely used and had never been used before in a labor dispute.

Until now.

Teachers were legislated back to work on Wednesday, October 29th.

This means that the government’s proposal, previously rejected by nearly 90% of teachers in the province, would go into effect.

Needless to say, last week was HARD. While we are glad to be back at our schools, we are devastated, sad and angry. Some of us are so demoralized that it will take some time before we can reorganize and get back on the horse, so to speak.

However, the broader society seems to have our back. The public has realized that this provincial government’s direction – talk of cessation, privatization of health services and schools, constant fight with Ottawa, just to name a few – is not based on Canadian values of a democratic society that preserves civil dialogue and public services. As one provincial labour leader famously said recently: teachers have awakened a sleeping giant.

There are recall petitions for about 1/2 of the MLA’s (Member of the Legislative Assembly) in Alberta, which means that if canvassers can collect a particular percentage of signatures in that MLAs riding (electoral district) it would trigger a new election in that riding.

Over the weekend I went to a “meet and greet” for my MLA thinking my teacher friends and I would be in the minority. Instead, we were greeted by a sea of red – the colour of our provincial teachers association. #Red4Ed is our hashtag. But not everyone there was a teacher. The were some angry parents as well.

Our province has been riled up. Granted, there are still many die hard United Conservative Party (UCP) voters, who no matter what their party does, they will vote for them. There’s not much that can be done about that. I believe there are many more critical thinkers out there who, while conservative leaning, are asking good questions and taking action to change the direction of the province.

This is energizing. Teachers are not alone!

All of this is to say (thank you if you’ve read this far!) that I think we can turn this around. And there are multiple citizen-led initiatives out there to prove it.

The stereotype that Canadians are soft-spoken and mild-mannered may be true to some extent, but don’t mess with our public services and democratic rights or you’ll have an angry citizenry primed to defend and stand up for what’s right.

I never thought I’d see this kind of activism here in Alberta, a province some refer to as the red neck province of Canada. Yet, Alberta of 2025 is not the Alberta of 2006, when I first moved here. Its newer inhabitants come from all parts of the world and even other provinces of Canada. Cowtown is reaching into the next century.

We can do this!

Cross posted to the Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life Tuesday Challenge.