Dazed and Confused

The past 24 hours in the Teachers Dispute has left this page scratching my head to the point of a band-aid covered scalp. It's one thing when the media projects an end to the strike, it's another when the President of the BC Federation of Labour tries to stage manage a happy ending without consulting the union involved. All Jim Sinclair needed to say was that the Fed reserves the right to further action, not that anybody was standing down or whether or not an action was appropriate. Those comments Thursday afternoon greatly disappointed the membership of the Fed's largest affiliate, and may have created a split in the labour movement in BC.

Also in the 'gutless' file (unless Global TV's Keith Baldrey's yanking our collective chain) I have to put the anonymous NDP MLA who told Baldrey that it was "presumptuous" for the BCTF to insist on amendments to the School Act with respect to class sizes. No, there might not be a Social Studies teacher on the BCTF Executive to explain how a legislative calendar works, but it would help if the NDP were pushing for the same legislation, rather than tut-tutting the BCTF because they want a commitment on the legislation in writing.

I attended this morning's rally at the Pacific Coliseum. As I expected, it made negligible impact, except to provide visuals of a triumphant Jinny Sims in front of a cheering crowd, which is probably the closest teachers are going to look like winners in this thing. I am too tired and feeling a little too sold out at this point to do the forensics on why this dispute was shoved to a resolution this weekend, but once the dust settles after the vote, I'll endeavour to put a crackpot theory or two forward for the readers of this page to enjoy.

To the teachers who were sitting behind me at the Coliseum: A class war is not a schoolroom riot, the term 'brothers and sisters' does not make us a cult, and people usually don't start filing out during 'Solidarity Forever'. We got your back, but understand, this is the way we roll.

For those of you scoring at home, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation had booked the lawn of the Vancouver Art Gallery today (where I said yesterday should have been the site of today's rally).