In their words: Why Ottawa high school students walked out

Students across the province cut class Thursday afternoon to protest proposed changes to Ontario's education system.

• Ontario students stage provincewide walkout to protest education changes

CBCdropped by three Ottawa high schools to ask students participating in the walkouts why they took part, and what they're hoping to accomplish.

Alwiya Hashim, Grade 12, Gloucester High School

[Because of] all the cuts that are happening within the system, all the autism programs as well as e-learning.Everyone has different kinds of learning, and we can't just force them to do one specific kind.

Lucca Orsini, Grade 10, Gloucester High School

I was reading the news, seeing all the changes and I thought, we shouldn't be having these changes to our education. I wanted to protest against these changes. I saw a lot of schools doing it so I decided why not take leadership and organize it.

Anthony Caputo, Grade 12, Lester B. Pearson Catholic High School

There were a lot of other schools around Ontario organizingand I felt strongly about the cause, so I felt that Pearson should participate in it.

I was hearing abouta lot of changes to the curriculum such as sex education.How they are changing up the math curriculum, how class sizes are increasing, and I just think that we should just have a manageable curriculum for both students and teachers.

Aileen Adan, Grade 12, Colonel By Secondary School

The changes Doug Ford made to our education system arereally ableist and classist.It affects people who can't afford many things in our society and people who have disabilities very tremendously. For example,the autism funding cuts really impactpeople with autism and their families on a daily basis.

Sophia White, Grade 12, Colonel By Secondary School

I'm studying to become a teacher, so obviously it will affect me in the future.I think with larger class sizes and teacher cuts it's already hard to focus as it is. Alot of my schoolmates were saying our classes are at full capacity also, [and] with budget cuts to the autism program, [it] is just not OK.

Nassima Marouf, Grade 11, Colonel By Secondary School

I'm walking out because I don't want to do the online courses. I don't want future generations to have to do math, chemistry, physics online. We really need our teachers in our classrooms to teach us. Having a teacher online from a private company who doesn't really care aboutour well-being to teach us isn't really what we want to see.

Scott Sharma, Colonel By Secondary School

The first thing that I saw that got me interested in organizing was the autism programfunding being cut in schools.

I think it sends a message to the government that we're not going to be messed with.

Having a brother who has gone through these programs because he has special needs, I saw how important it was for him to contribute toour community, and I saw him really develop through the program.

I was actually quite sad to see those programs be cut.

I think it sends a message to the government that we're not going to be messed with.

Students across our school board and across the province will be emailing their MPPs,walking on the legislature ... to say that these educational changes are not what we want. It's not'for the people,'as the government says, and we, frankly, say no to these changes.

Ottawa students participate in provincewide walkout to protest education changes

6 years ago

Duration 1:30

Ottawa students participate in provincewide walkout to protest education changes