Algonquin College will cancel classes if faculty go on strike Friday morning

Algonquin College says all classes will be temporarily suspended if professors and instructors go on strike Friday morning.

Talks will resume Thursday morning between Ontario's 24 community colleges and the College of Applied Arts and Technology-Academic employee bargaining team, which represents 16,000 full-time and partial-load professors, instructors, librarians and counsellors. The bargaining team says it will go on strike at 12:01 a.m. Friday if the College Employer Council does not agree to voluntary binding interest arbitration.

In a letter to students on Wednesday, Algonquin College President and CEO Claude Brule says the college is "doing all that we can to minimize disruption for our learners."

"While we may be facing a difficult time, I have every confidence that the Algonquin College community – all of us – will proceed in the coming days and weeks with a commitment to our values of Caring, Learning, Integrity, and Respect," Brule said.

Brule says students will receive information from the various departments on what will happen in the event of a strike. However, if there is a labour disruption, Brule says the following will happen:

• All classes (including virtual/remotely delivered courses) at the Ottawa, Pembroke and Perth campuses will be temporarily suspended. The AC Online campus programs will continue without disruption.
• Continuing Education and Corporate Training classes will continue unless students are advised otherwise by your program
• Field and clinical placements will be suspended during the full strike unless students are advised otherwise by your program
• Co-op work terms will continue
• Students will retain access to BrightSpace
• Students will be permitted to access all campuses in order to use available resources and services, such as the Library, labs, bookstores, athletic centres, Student Commons, the AC Hub, residences, and communal areas used for group work and study.

The College Employer Council, the government-mandated bargaining agent for the colleges, said the colleges are trying to avoid a labour disruption following two years of disruptions due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We've tried everything to avoid a strike," CEO Graham Lloyd told CTV News at Noon. "We actually approached them a year ago, before formal bargaining was scheduled to begin in July, with the view to extending the agreement for two years – spending the next two years bargaining and negotiating but avoid, at all costs, a disruption in their education."

Lloyd said the College Employer Council and the union would return to the bargaining table on Thursday.

"Hopefully, cooler heads will prevail and they will call off the strike."

OPSEU says its members rejected the college's final offer in February.

In a statement on Twitter, the bargaining team said talks would resume with "no preconditions."

"Both parties will meet Thurs. to attempt to reach a negotiated settlement prior to the strike deadline at 12.01 am Friday, March 18. If real progress is being made, we are willing to extend the strike deadline," CAAT Faculty said on Twitter.

On Monday, the chair of the faculty bargaining team said the faculty is "desperately trying to avoid a strike", and accused the CEC of refusing to bargain.

"Our members are fighting for the best education for students," JP Hornick said. "We haven't made any unreasonable demands, and everything we have asked for is easily achievable."