Calgary students participated in a province-wide school walkout Thursday in response to the outcome of the Alberta teachers’ strike.
Alberta Students for Teachers is a group that worked to organize walkouts in high schools across the city. Organizer Arya Mishra told the Calgary Eye Opener She sees the protest as an opportunity for students to make their voices heard.
“Politicians and a lot of people are saying things that supposedly come from students,” said Mishra, a Grade 12 student at William Aberhart Middle School. “I have yet to see many students repeat those same statements.”
Calgary Eye Opener9:11Student strikes in support of teachers
Students are walking out of classes in support of teachers today. We spoke to a couple of organizers about the plan and the message they want to send to the province.
Students returned to school Wednesday after the provincial government introduced back-to-work legislation for striking teachers on Monday, which included the province invoking the notwithstanding clause.
Bill 2, or the Back to School Act, marked the end of labor action that saw more than 50,000 members of the Alberta Teachers’ Association go on strike more than three weeks ago.
Mishra said she and her fellow protesters want to make it clear that they support the teachers.
“We understand why the strike happened,” he said. “We want caps on classrooms and we want January diplomas to be optional.”
An online petition calling for Alberta’s January 2026 diploma exams to be made optional in light of the strike currently has more than 27,000 signatures. The province announced that the November diploma exams for Grade 12 students will be optional approximately two weeks after the strike.
“Now, thanks to the back-to-work legislation, we are going back to school and no changes have been made,” Mishra said. “That’s frustrating for students.”
Buddy Alberta Student Teacher Organizer Vaisnavi Venkateshwaran is a Grade 12 student at Sir Winston Churchill Secondary School. She says she is motivated to protest because she believes the provincial return-to-work legislation is a violation of constitutional rights.
“No matter what your political affiliation is… we have a duty to defend those rights,” he said. “If we take this slow, it will set a precedent that we will take it slow for anything in the future.”
“As a 12th grader and a future voter, I have a duty to be educated and a duty to fight for what I believe in,” she said. “I think that’s something that a lot of students really feel the same way.”
Minister and school board say students must stay in class
In an emailed statement, Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides said “sStudents have a variety of ways they can express themselves and we will always respect their right to peacefully assemble and protest. However, it is important that they are in class and do not disrupt their own learning or that of others.”
In a statement sent to CBC News, the Calgary Catholic School District acknowledged that the strikes would take place on Thursday, but said ““Our district does not endorse or sanction a student strike.”
The school board said protesting does not meet the criteria for an excused absence under the provincial Education Act.
““Students who participate will not be supervised by teachers or administrators,” the school board said. “Any student’s participation in this event will result in an unexcused absence.”
