Picture this if you will: Two parents in a nasty custody battle. One parent has just received a court ruling vindicating her/his actions in a recent dispute. The other parent is now silently plotting how to regain the upper hand in the custody/maintenance fight. Then imagine this: The children standing in a room hoping that someone will step in and help their parents to see that the only people being hurt in this battle are them.
Fill in that picture a bit more. One of the kids has special needs and is trying very hard to just keep up in school. The second child has dreams of being a scientist, the third child is young enough just to want to go out and have some fun in a school playground. All of these children are suffering in this custody/maintenance battle, and all of them have much more to lose than either parent.
We suspect you've realized by the first paragraph of this editorial what our simple analogy refers to. Our front-page story today might have been our front-page story from last year, the year before that, and the year before that. The only difference now is that this time the Liberals were caught red-handed trying to provoke the teachers. But does anyone really care who started this fight or who is right or wrong?
We suspect the parents in this city, as other parents in other cities, just want it to end. They want their kids with special needs to get the help they deserve, the kids with dreams of being scientists to have the lab equipment and computers that will help them learn and achieve, and the little one who just wants to be able to play in the school playground to be able to enjoy something other than bark mulch. Is that really too much to ask for?
Clearly everybody - the government and the teachers - is going to have to compromise to make sure that students get what they need and deserve. And parents aren't just bystanders in this situation. We've covered all sides of this story, and no one has completely clean hands in it. There are a lot of ways that parents can get more involved and speak up - parent advisory councils are just one example. Stand up, speak out, and push for a fair deal for students.
