COVID-19: More than ever, it’s time to fight for free education

By Manuel Rato

Cet article est également disponible en français

For many students, COVID-19 is synonymous with anxiety: anxiety about the accommodation they will probably no longer be able to afford at the end of the month, anxiety about their food and summer jobs so essential for making ends meet and paying higher and higher tuition fees.
These concerns are not limited to finances. Everyone wonders what will happen to their school career, their term, their exams. It is obvious that both the current material and psychological conditions are not conducive to study. Universities and schools must not turn into brain-shaping centers for the interests of Capital. On the contrary, they are places devoted to the dissemination of knowledge and personal development. It is for this reason that the end of the 2020 semester and school year should be declared, and all students who are not failing should move on to the next year. Credits should be awarded to students on a pass/fail basis. These measures are not so extraordinary: the University of Quebec in Trois-Rivières and the University of Quebec in Outaouais have already applied them. Many petitions are circulating for this purpose.

It is impossible to predict the end of the health crisis. However, for a good number of students, the simple fact of registering at the university implies moving to urban centers, and therefore signing a lease for the duration of the school year. If the extraordinary measures applied to curb the pandemic (that is, the closing of schools and universities) continue for another month, there is a good chance that these leases will expire, or that the students will have other plans for the summer, which presents a real logistical puzzle. For those who live in student accommodation, the majority of which are closed, resuming classes in a month implies a new move.

For international students, this puzzle is even more crucial: as student residences empty, their only option is either to take up residence with friends, or return home. However, not all countries have the means necessary to repatriate them. What is there to do for nationals of countries in the grip of war or occupation (Syria, Iraq, Palestine, etc.)? How can they manage if they contract COVID-19 when their access to universal health care is limited despite the $25,000 they pay, on average, in tuition fees?

In his various announcements, Trudeau contented himself with promising students amnesty on interest payments on their student debt. However, he fails to put in place an amnesty on student debt itself, much less a measure promoting access to higher education. Once the health crisis has been overcome, bills risk spiking. With consumer debts having accumulated, the return to interest payments on the $30,000 on average that each student must pay in Canada will be all the more brutal.

Faced with this situation, the meager $2,000 a month that Trudeau offers in emergency aid means very little in the grand scheme of things (especially for students who do not have access to it). This sum does not even allow one to survive in several urban centers of the country (where universities, colleges, and CEGEPs are concentrated).

The question of the quality of our education also arises. Indeed, if technology currently allows classes to continue remotely, and supposedly to meet the extraordinary needs of the moment, the fact remains that there is danger of extending its use even after the pandemic has ended, at the expense of the quality of education. In the same way that we risk trivializing telework, we will pretend that the distance courses are running smoothly to “reorganize and rationalize resources”, that is to say, to justify the dismissal of teachers, their accumulation of tasks (teaching in several schools via the internet, teaching in several classes at the same time, etc.) to the detriment of their working conditions, and, therefore, to students’ study conditions.

It doesn’t take clairvoyance to understand that the measures which our government proposes to students are not only insufficient, but they point us in a dangerous direction, a direction in which one tries to make students, young people, and the working masses pay for the bulk of the expenses of this crisis.

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the contradictions of the capitalist system to those who still doubted its existence. This system is clearly incapable of solving the problems of the population unless the exploiters derive some benefit from it. It is therefore no coincidence that the countries that are doing best are those where we can conclude with confidence that the recovery, once the pandemic is over, will not be in the interests of the wealthy, but in the interests of the people, and where the majority benefit from extensive public services, in particular in the area of ​​healthcare.

Expansion of public services, defence of public monopolies, and the nationalization of key sectors of the economy are the keys to preventing employers from gaining even a dollar out of the $260 billion that Trudeau has granted. From a student perspective, we recognize the urgent need for the recognition of education at all levels as a public service, which must be accessible and free of charge to all, as well as provided publicly (with no place given to private corporations in education). We also recognize the need to fight for a democratic and quality education – we say no to courses geared towards the needs of employers. Finally, we state loud and clear that, like health, education is not a commodity!