Jamie Nye: The blame game around Hoopla’s demise

It was heartbreaking to hear the Saskatchewan High Schools Athletic Association make the call to cancel the provincial basketball championships.

Wednesday night was it for high school basketball with some city championships being completed.

Band trips, ski trips and theatre shows will all be impacted as well with the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation pulling back extracurricular activities.

I hate that our kids get impacted like this in a labour dispute between teachers and the government. Sometimes it’s graduations or full-on strikes; this time it’s sports, band and drama.

But it’s really the only leverage teachers have. If they strike, pull back on extracurricular or take other job action, it will impact kids.

What also impacts kids are terrible class sizes and lack of EAs, which are things teachers want to see improved.

So if you want to lay blame, lay off the teachers themselves.

Remember how much the teachers who coached or directed cared about you when you were a kid. I do. The teachers aren’t taking any joy in seeing these things cancelled.