For 52-year-old scholar Heather Kennedy, getting an training via Mohawk Faculty’s Metropolis Faculty program was offering hope she’d be capable of herald extra money to assist her household.
Kennedy was hoping to grow to be an administrator after taking free programs via this system. With its upcoming closure, introduced alongside different cuts on the school, she’s nervous she will not be capable of obtain that objective.
“I believe it is a disgrace,” mentioned Kennedy.
Metropolis Faculty is a free service that provides post-secondary and employment-pathway programs to the adults in the neighborhood and has been run by Mohawk Faculty in Hamilton.
In December, as a part of cuts due to new limits on international students and a lack of provincial funding, the faculty introduced Metropolis Faculty could be winding down its operations and cease providing programs as of March 31. Drop-in places closed on Feb. 10.
Kennedy was amongst a bunch of individuals that rallied on Feb. 19 exterior of Mohawk to protest cuts to high schools and to advocate for Metropolis Faculty.
She mentioned she discovered concerning the program in 2024 whereas taking a look at flyers at a meals financial institution. She enrolled and began a course known as Faculty 101. She’s at the moment taking two programs in hopes of working for a non-profit.
Kennedy mentioned she utilized for the programs as a result of she desires to “enhance [her] life” and be taught new issues. She added the programs have helped her quite a bit.
“I am attempting to get a leg up so I can earn extra money and assist my household. It is helped me be taught a whole lot of abilities. So I am blissful about that,” she mentioned.
Kennedy works as a caretaker, however mentioned at a time when costs hold going up and life is getting “more durable and more durable,” she desires to contribute extra to her household’s funds.
Petition asks school to ‘rethink’ closure
Kennedy shouldn’t be alone in her disappointment with the closure.
Companions of this system began a petition, which has garnered greater than 300 signatures from neighborhood members and 30 neighborhood companions.
Erin Carr, govt director of the Solidarity Place Employee Schooling Centre, one of many non-profit organizations that partnered with Metropolis Faculty, mentioned he began the petition in late January after conversations with the union.
“Metropolis Faculty was on the bottom, well-liked, free and accessible training, which is one thing in our province we’re sorely missing,” he mentioned.
There have been 415 college students enrolled in Metropolis Faculty final 12 months, in line with Sarah Harvie, vice-president for OPSEU Native 241, which represents assist employees at Mohawk Faculty.
In keeping with a spokesperson from Mohawk Faculty, there have been 13 employees employed with Metropolis Faculty and eight to 10 part-time instructors per semester. Harvie mentioned solely three or 4 stay, probably attributable to their connection to different packages on the school.
Greater than a dozen Mohawk packages had been suspended in December and by February, 255 full-time jobs had been misplaced.
A type of impacted was Sarah Bradshaw, a coaching specialist at Mohawk Faculty and part-time teacher at Metropolis Faculty. She mentioned this system is totally different from different neighborhood teaching programs “as a result of it acts because the hyperlink between the neighborhood and the faculty.”
Metropolis Faculty supplied school programs in areas just like the Eva Rothwell Centre, Hamilton Public Library and Mission Providers.
It began with a $50,000 funding nearly 10 years in the past, and though Mohawk Faculty cites a $1 million finances want, Metropolis Faculty may function “comfortably” with $300,000, she mentioned.
Harvie mentioned with the petition, the neighborhood is asking for this system to not be shut down fully.
“We’re asking the faculty to rethink, and we’re asking for important assist from the province so we aren’t slamming the door shut to college students who’re altering their lives with the assist of packages like Metropolis Faculty,” she mentioned.
In an electronic mail to CBC Hamilton, Mohawk Faculty spokesperson Sean Coffey mentioned the faculty discovered the Metropolis Faculty mannequin was “not sustainable,” whereas acknowledging “this system was in a position to assist many individuals in the neighborhood because it started operation in 2015.”
Metropolis Faculty was a spot for ‘transformation’: teacher
Jess Robertson, an teacher with this system, mentioned the service is a spot for “transformation.”
“The considered Metropolis Faculty closing is a ache like no different as a result of I do know there are such a lot of extra people who may benefit from this program, from the assist, from the chance to find their potential,” she mentioned.
Robertson taught 13 programs at Metropolis Faculty and mentioned the connection made within the classroom was what set it other than others.
“There may be laughter, pleasure and a shared dedication to progress,” she mentioned.
Carr additionally teaches at Metropolis Faculty, he mentioned the service means quite a bit to college students.
“[City School offers] a pathway to post-secondary training, there’s upskilling, future employability, nevertheless it’s additionally constructing social relationships. Our college students, they’re a close-knit neighborhood,” he mentioned.
His college students come from all totally different walks of life, he mentioned.
“[Some] are in shelters proper now, people which were dealt a extremely powerful hand in life, that no less than hope to dig out of that gap. That was one thing that Metropolis Faculty supplied,” he mentioned.
The success of Metropolis Faculty additionally spanned past Hamilton, Harvie mentioned.
This system partnered with schools in Vancouver, Winnipeg and Halifax to share Metropolis Faculty’s mannequin and the way it may very well be replicated elsewhere.
“It was a implausible partnership that highlighted the distinctive qualities of Metropolis Faculty as a made-in-Hamilton answer to fulfill the coaching and training wants of our neighborhood,” she added.
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