CSDM: More protests planned over bumped students

Parents of students at Lambert-Closse elementary school in Montreal's Mile-End neighbourhood plan to protest in front of the school once again on Tuesday.

They vow to force the city's largest French-language school board to make room for 13 students who have been told there's no room for them at the school.

The Commission Scolaire de Montréal (CSDM) said Monday it has found space to allow about one-third of the 143 students who were bumped from the schools they attended last year to return to those schools.

• CSDM warns budget cuts will hurt school services 

• FACE students form human chain to protest Quebec education cuts

"We're conscious of what parents are going through when a student has to change schools," said CSDM chairwoman Catherine Harel-Bourdon. "But we've also had a major increase in the number of students."

"There were a lot of immigrant students arriving during the summer. Many parents registered their children at the last minute, and we have budget constraints. We have to deal with this whole situation all in the first few days of school."

13 still 'out in the cold' at Lambert-Closse

At Lambert-Closse school in Mile-End last week, parents of 18 children found out that they had to find new schools for their children, all of whom live outside of the school's designated boundaries.

The head of the school's governing board, Yves Blanchet, says he has heard from the board that only 5 of the 18 children affected will be able to return to Lambert-Closse.

One of those students is Ethan, 9, whose mother Tania Carreira had all but given up hope.

"I never thought that...this change of situation could happen after what we were told on Thursday last week," she said.

Carreira says her son is thrilled to be able to join his old friends in his fourth grade class. 

She's happy, too, but still angry at the board.

"This was a complete waste of time," she said, "a complete waste of energy – taking us through a lot of emotions for no reason."

Blanchet said the governing board will still fight for the students for whom the CSDM has not found a place at Lambert-Closse.

"Thirteen students are still out in the cold, facing trauma," he said. "They want to be here with their community, with their brothers and sisters."

FACE parents, students to form human chain

Other schools are holding their own protests on Tuesday.

At FACE, where the school community formed a human chain last June to protest against cuts to education, the parent participation organization (PPO) called on parents to use the same tactic again, between 7:30 and 8:00 a.m.

Meanwhile, AMDES, the association representing principals and other senior administrators at the CSDM and the Pointe-de-l'Île school board, said its members will not be participating in the human-chain demonstrations planned by several schools.

"Our members are in the front row, witnessing the negative impact on our students of cuts and underfinancing that education has fallen victim to in recent months," AMDES' president, Hélène Bourdages, said in a statement. "However, participation in a human chain is incompatible with our role, which is to ensure safety and order in our schools and to accommodate in the best spirit our students and staff."

Bourdages urged the government to respond quickly to the "legitimate worries" of parents, teachers and principals.