Translating the printemps érable

Martin Croteau          July 10, 2012

Original French Text: http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/dossiers/conflit-etudiant/201207/10/01-4542240-la-classe-fait-ecole-en-ontario.php

PHOTO CAPTION: The co-spokesperson for CLASSE, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, will be at the University of Ottawa Thursday to talk about the success of the Quebec student movement. “The key principle of success in Quebec is exportable. Because it’s our mode of organization.”

(Ottawa) Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois and the leaders of CLASSE will go to Ontario over the course of the next two weeks in order to describe their fight against the increase of tuition fees in Quebec.

Mr. Nadeau-Dubois will speak Thursday at the University of Ottawa. Two other leaders of CLASSE, as well as representatives of cégep student associations, will trade off throughout this tour, which will stop in 10 Ontarian cities.

The Ontarian division of the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS), which organized the tour, thinks that the province’s students have a lot to learn from their fellow members in Quebec. The spokes person Sarah Jayne King underlines that these members have suffered an increase of 71% of tuition fees since 2006.

And yet, the Ontarian students were already paying the highest tuition fees in Canada. This is why, according to Ms. King, many are “inspired” by the student conflict in Quebec.

“The students turn toward Quebec, where the tuition fees are the lowest in Canada, and where the students lead a fierce struggle against the steep hike,” she explains.

Mr. Nadeau-Dubois and his fellow members will describe their experience as student activists. The will also explain how they succeeded in creating a mobilization so important as the one that took place this spring.

“Many see the Quebec case as an example of mobilization that worked and that allowed the rallying of a large part of the population. It’s obvious that it’s inspiring for an enormous number of people. And, evidently, we can give them a hand if they hope to mobilize in their province.”

The “maple spring” was followed very closely in English Canada. The Quebec student leaders were invited to make speeches about it. Unions handled donations and logistical support for the mobilization in Quebec.

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Translated from the original French by Translating the printemps érable.

*Translating the printemps érable is a volunteer collective attempting to balance the English media’s extremely poor coverage of the student conflict in Québec by translating media that has been published in French into English. These are amateur translations; we have done our best to translate these pieces fairly and coherently, but the final texts may still leave something to be desired. If you find any important errors in any of these texts, we would be very grateful if you would share them with us at translatingtheprintempsderable@gmail.com. Please read and distribute these texts in the spirit in which they were intended; that of solidarity and the sharing of information.