I love school. As a member of the graduating class of 2012, nearly 13 years have passed since my first day of kindergarten, and let me tell you now, not all of it has been fun.
I've been assigned piles of homework so high and so difficult I wanted to rip up my textbooks and throw them on a fire. I've sat through courses so mind-numbingly boring that the doodles I did in lieu of paying attention reached peaks of quality (and quantity) I'd never thought attainable. I've dealt with students, administrators and teachers so infuriating that the tongue-lashings I've fantasized about giving them on graduation day have never seemed harsh enough.
Yes, the last 13 years of my education have had their ups and downs - so why is it I can still say with all honesty, "I love school"? One simple reason, really - the teachers.
As I mentioned above, there have been some who have gotten on my nerves, and perhaps I am unfairly biased towards those who teach subjects I hate. Taking that bias into account, there have been only about seven or eight teachers that I really didn't like. That's seven or eight out of a grand total of approximately 40. I'd say the odds are pulling in their favour.
As a young child, I tended to put teachers on a pedestal. How could I not? They were always kind, always willing to lend a hand or explain a difficult concept, and they seemed to know everything. Even when I reached high school I continued to look at my educators through a rather rosy veil - though I'd encountered some lessthan-stellar ones by that point, they were still the collective sensei to my young grasshopper, and I wanted to be taught. I wanted to be mentored.
Over the last five years, I've come to see my teachers as something else - as people. They are not all-knowing, they are not all-powerful, and they are certainly not perfect. They have families, dreams, opinions, tastes, troubles, fears and flaws like anyone else. And they, too, have to work for a living.
They, too, have children who depend on them. And instead of committing to a high-paying, stable, relatively stress-free job, they have elected to spend countless hours trying to teach us, to prepare us for the world, both by educating us and simply by being there when we need them.
All of this is why it breaks my heart that Bill 22 could even be suggested, and why I participated in the student walkout on March 2. I have seen teachers in
tears because of what this bill is doing to them and their jobs. Because of this one little piece of legislation, teachers will lose what little power they have over class sizes, their own workload, and what and how they can teach.
To add insult to injury, the majority of people ignorant of the content of the bill believe that the recent strike has been an attempt by the teachers to receive higher pay.
Now, I've talked to a lot of teachers about this, and they've all told me that they have long been aware that they aren't getting a fatter paycheque.
Nobody in the province is, much less the ninthworst-paid teachers in Canada.
What they are protesting is the removal of their right to have control over their working conditions.
Lest we forget, the teachers are all members of a union, something that was invented with the express intent to protect labourers from unsafe or unfair working conditions. B.C.'s Education Improvement Act of 2012 amends the previous School Act in order to ensure that the teachers are not only completely under the thumb of the boards, but that they can do nothing to defend themselves. All of this is going on, and yet I have encountered several people - including some family members - who not only didn't know, but were surprised to hear that the strike is not just about money. Big Brother, meet your proletariat.
This is my last year in the B.C. public school system. In a few short months, I will be left at the mercy of the so-called "real world," and, knowing me, roughly 75 to 80 per cent of what I've learned in the past 13 years is going to be forgot-ten. But I will remember my teachers. I will remember the ones who made me excited to come to their class, the ones who have cried in front of me and let me cry in front of them, who supported me when I needed it most, and who made some of the greatest experiences of my life possible.
I will remember all the sweat, blood and tears that my teachers have put into my education, an education that has shaped the person I am today.
And I will remember how disgusting it is that these hardworking, brilliant people have been pushed around the way they have.
It's taken me 13 years to realize it, but I love my teachers, and I love school. And if I do have kids one day, I want to make sure that they are able to say the same.
Aaliya Alibhai is a Burnaby student.
