Downtown rally brings Toronto students together to support the fight against post-secondary tuition fees
Nabil Shenouda
Contributor
As Quebec students continue their fight against post-secondary education tuition fees, York students joined in to show their support in a downtown rally June 5.
A group of around 300 protesters, which included York students and those from post-secondary institutions across Toronto, marched from George Brown College to Ryerson University, spreading their messages of solidarity with the Quebec effort and their discontent with post secondary tuition.
The march started at King and George Street at 8:30 p.m. and reached Yonge and Gould Street by 9:20 p.m.
The main message from the protestors was that education is a basic right, and as such, should be free.
“We will not give up the fight. Education is a right,” was one frequent chant that rang out during the march. Protestors also held signs saying, “Education is a social right,” and “Education should not be a debt sentence.”
Organizers of the rally arranged for several speakers to address the group once the march reached Ryerson University. Among these speakers was Alastair Woods, York Federation of Students (YFS) vice-president of campaigns and advocacy.
Woods expressed his support for free, public post secondary education. He commented on the resignation of Quebec’s former Minister of Education, Line Beauchamp, and her subsequent admission of the strength of the student organizations, as a victory for the student protestors of Quebec.
“I want to hear those exact same words come out of the mouth of Glen Murray,” said Woods.
The students Excalibur spoke with unanimously said that their march was for the removal of all barriers to education, including tuition of any amount and expressed a desire to keep the situation in Ontario peaceful.
All having spent some time with their counterparts in Quebec, York students said they view them as an example upon which Ontario students can mould themselves.
“It sets an example for the fight against inequality,” said Farshad Azadian, a fifth-year psychology student at York.
For Amelia Saunders, a fourth-year York sexuality studies student, the march on Tuesday night was especially important because it was a step towards bringing the struggle against tuition fees to Ontario, more specifically Toronto.
Saunders said it is essential that this movement spread to Canada’s financial centre, in order to counteract what she sees as an overwhelmingly conservative culture that has taken over.
She said that attending institutions like university helps people become informed citizens, which opens their eyes to struggles like this one, and the political and social underpinnings that fuel it.
“Toronto is deeply embedded in capitalism,” said Saunders.
Jahan Niroomand, a fifth-year York political science student said that he hopes for a general assembly on York’s campus where people can come not only to learn about the issues, but to also discuss concrete actions activists can take in order to continue their struggle, such as strikes and walk-outs.
Saunders said that these processes are generally slow, referring to the time that it took for the Quebec student movement to gain momentum.
“It will probably take about a year or two to get things moving,” she said.
Protestors also attacked rising tuition fees through bringing up broader issues such as the austerity that is spreading in the wake of the European financial crisis.
For Niroomand, Tuesday night’s march was a step toward a much broader goal to increase the standards and scope of social services in general. He said having groups like the labour movement represented, and voicing their concerns at the march was a valuable component in forming connections by reaching across the educational, professional and social lines that divide individuals.
One action that Niroomand would like to see taken by the Quebec student movement in reaching across those lines is to send delegations to the workplace, where he argues that workers’ rights are closely linked to students’ rights.
“If they want to succeed, they have to reach out to the community,” he said.
Currently in Quebec, the organizers of Montreal’s Grand Prix have decided to cancel the free opening day of the event in fear of the protests affect.
Student protests have now been taking place in Quebec since 2011 when Finance Minister Raymond Bachand announced Quebec’s plans to raise tuition fees in September 2012.
