A student organization that describes itself as "revolutionary, combative, militant and anti-capitalist" is holding a rally against the Rainbow District School Board's planned school closures this afternoon.
Organized by the Revolutionary Student Movement, the event gets underway at the corner of Elm and Durham streets at 3 p.m. The event organizers plan to march on the Rainbow board's downtown administrative office.
Greater Sudbury Police are warning drivers that the information rally could disrupt traffic at the busy downtown intersection for about two hours, from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.
Police will be on hand, saying they're working with organizers to keep the peace and ensure public safety. GSPS is also asking motorists in the area to be patient and respectful of the rally participants. They also suggest motorists might want to find another route.
Trustees with the board will make a final decision on school closures Feb. 7.
A press release from Revolutionary Student Movement said if the school closures go ahead, it will mean “overcrowding and understaffing all across the board. Massive drop in the quality of education. Lumping of elementary, middle and high school students into the same building.
“Absurdly long commutes to and from school, upwards of several hours each way in many cases. Slashing of French Immersion, Ojibwe classes and extracurricular programs.”
On its Facebook page, the group describes itself as the Canada-wide, revolutionary, combative, militant, and anti-capitalist student movement.
"We align our struggles with those of the broader working class. We are a movement guided by communist principles that serves the people in their fight for emancipation from the capitalist system," says the group's mission statement.
"We organize proletarian students in the interest of the revolutionary working class movement. We are revolutionary, not reformist. We maintain our independence from the bourgeois state, and we support the peoples’ struggles against capitalism, imperialism, and colonialism in Canada and internationally."
Learn more about the march on the event's Facebook page.
