Warning: This article contains descriptions of police brutality at the March 4th rally.

On March 4^th, hundreds of students and community members gathered at Queen’s Park in Toronto for the Hands Off Our Education Rally. This demonstration was organized by the Canadian Federation of Students Ontario (CFS) in response to the Ford government’s proposed removal of the tuition freeze and funding changes to the Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP).

The protest was facilitated by CFS Chairperson Cyrielle Ngeleka and National Executive Representative Omar Mousa who introduced speakers and led a variety of chants, including a recurring chant of  “the students, united, will never be defeated.”

On February 12^th, Minister of Colleges, Universities, Research Excellence, and Security Nolan Quinn announced that OSAP funding would be reconfigured from a maximum ratio of 85% grants to 15% loans to a maximum of 25% grants to 75% loans for students of the utmost financial need. He also declared the government’s plans to eliminate the tuition freeze set in 2019, allowing “publicly assisted colleges and universities to raise tuition by up to 2%” annually.

These proposed changes were paired with the announcement of the Ford government’s “new long term funding model” of investing $6.4 billion into the post-secondary sector over four years.

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Protesters were supported by provincial parties like the Ontario Liberals and NDP, representatives of student organizations like CFS-ON and the Trent Central Student Associations (TCSA), and various local workers’ unions.

“Colleges just laid off 10,000 workers,” Marit Stiles, Leader of the Ontario NDP, said. 

“Post-secondary institutions…are struggling, and we need to make sure that they are properly funded, but that is the government’s responsibility, that should not be borne only on the backs of students—especially, frankly, the most vulnerable students,” she told Arthur.

“We would like the officials that are elected to remember that they are elected to work for us,” said TCSA President and CFS Treasurer Iyiola Alade. “There are international students out here, there are workers out here, and that is because we all recognize that none of us are free until all of us are free.”

The Ford government has been urging the pursuit of higher education in in-demand sectors, with Doug Ford telling students to “go into healthcare, go into trades, go into jobs of the future, focus on STEM.” 

However, Sierra Punchard, President of the Trent/Fleming Nursing Students Association, claims that these proposed cuts will deter future students from entering these fields.

“If Ontario is serious about addressing the Nursing shortage, it needs to restore OSAP to what it was, acknowledge the reality of unpaid clinical labour, and ensure tuition does not become a barrier for qualified students entering our profession,” Punchard said in her speech at Queen’s Park. 

“Students choose nursing because we believe in public healthcare, because we believe in dignity, because we believe that patients deserve safe, competent care. But our passion does not offset our debt, and our commitment to help does not pay our rent.”

Ishita, a first year Mechanical Engineering student at the University of Toronto (UofT) echoed Punchard’s sentiments.

“These barriers that Doug Ford is imposing,” she told Arthur, “it’s not only a barrier towards the arts—which is a backbone of our culture—but a barrier towards STEM courses as well. Engineering is one of the costliest programs here at UofT, and so by reducing that, [he’s] literally reducing people who are interested in the sciences but can’t access that because OSAP has been their lifeline.”

This was a sentiment shared by many students Arthur spoke to at the rally.

“[These cuts] are going to endanger the future of tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of students in Ontario, of education in Ontario,” said Sascha, a History/Theatre student at UofT and member of the Revolutionary Communist Party.

“It’s an attack on everyone. It’s an attack on students, first and foremost, but honestly the whole working class, anyone who has kids who wants them to be able to afford an education.”

Gord, an actor, writer, and father, emphasized the impact that OSAP cuts would have on his children’s futures, as well as the harm caused by Ford’s comments targeting the arts and humanities.

“To say that people are studying basket weaving and denigrating any kind of education that is outside what he basically wants the people to become—which is people that are going to work for and in a system that needs to change and discourages creative and critical thinking—is an insult to me, my colleagues, and everybody,” he said.

At 3 PM, as the crowd was dwindling, police arrived on the scene, prompting an escalation. 

Casper, a witness, was talking to CFS organizers when they turned around to see students defacing the statue of journalist and politician George Brown.

“I saw [officers] shoving people before they even confronted the guy with the spray paint. There was no reason for them to respond so violently so quickly,” they told Arthur. “I didn’t even see them give the guy [with the spray paint] a warning before they yanked him off the statue and onto the ground. That was around the point we started backing up, but I saw a lot of pushing and shoving on the cops’ end and a lot of yelling on the crowd’s end.”

In a Toronto Police Services (TPS) news release from March 5th, the Service alleges that “the first accused vandalized a monument with spray paint” while “the second accused spat on an officer,” detailing that “while officers were attempting to place the first accused under arrest, a number of other protesters became aggressive toward the officers and interfered with the arrest.” 

A video obtained by Arthur shows both arrests by Toronto police officers. The footage of the first arrest shows TPS officers carrying the first person in cuffs by one arm and one leg before dropping them to the ground and detaining the protester inside a Special Constable’s vehicle. The video also shows an officer tackling the second arrestee headfirst into a barricade, with two more officers pinning them prone to the ground before detaining them.

At multiple points, the video shows officers physically blocking both arrests and shoving protestors back. 

In a statement released on March 5th, CFS claimed that “students were tackled to the ground, dragged through the mud, shoved, and in some cases, even hit with objects ripped from the hands of other attendees.”

In the same news release, Toronto Police Services confirmed two individuals were arrested following the March 4th rally: the first for mischief and damage to property under $5,000, and the second for assaulting a peace officer. CFS stated that “the two arrestees have since been released and will continue to be supported by the Federation and partnered organizations.”

“We see these attacks for what they are—deliberate attempts to repress, [and] intimidate students who refuse to stand silent in the face of attacks on our education and our campuses,” CFS wrote in a public statement.

With files from Kyle Nilsen.