Local Educational Support workers from Golden Hills School Division held a demonstration on Wednesday, August 7 to bring awareness and support.
Members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) #2347 were on South Railway Avenue near MLA Nate Horner’s Office last Wednesday. Local Vice President Christine Jakubowsky expressed their goals.
“It is two-fold, it is the CUPE Alberta’s province-wide Wages Ahead campaign, and a fight for a living wage for all CUPE members and all public work sectors in the province, in combination with our Purple Fights Poverty for Education workers,” she explains.
CUPE #2347 represents about 40 people. These are Education Support workers, such as teacher assistants and office administration. They wanted to shed light on their situation.
“We’re here to let you know that our students have changed, our job descriptions have changed, but our wages haven’t changed to keep up with that,” she said. “We do what we do because we love it. We knew we weren’t going to get rich doing it but we didn’t expect to have to work three or four jobs to make ends meet.”
She said the community support is strong.
“We have had a lot of people stop by, a lot of honking and waving. A visitor to the valley from Ontario drove by and hollered at us that she was CUPE from Ontario and she supported us all the away.”
CUPE Local #2347 goes into bargaining September 1.
