Hi everyone! Today I’m going to be talking about a virtual letter writing campaign I started because of the 2025 Alberta Teacher Strike!
Even though it’s all over the news, with political debates and back-and-forth negotiations, there’s a massive crucial voice that’s been totally missing from the conversation. That voice is ours (the youth). As students (all the way from Grade 1 up to Grade 12), we’re the ones sitting in uncertainty. We’re feeling the direct, stressful impact of missed material, delayed exams, and a major disruption to our daily lives.
My name is Diya Kunisetty. A Grade 11 Full IB student and the Chair of the Young Politicians of Canada (YPC) – Alberta Chapter. It’s basically a youth led, nonprofit, and non-partisan organization that aims to foster civic engagement amongst youth and provide them with opportunities to lead initiatives and get their voices heard. Because I was personally affected by the chaos, I knew we couldn’t just wait around, which is why I started (with the help of our amazing team, shoutout to Diva Negi who is also part of the YAA blog) : “Your Voice Matters.”
What is “Your Voice Matters”?
Our goal was to simply give every student a safe, anonymous way to share their honest thoughts, because I know that not everyone wants to be interviewed on camera or use their full name. On the other hand, everyone has a strong opinion when it comes to their education. So, we built a virtual letter-writing campaign where students could anonymously send us detailed, thoughtful letters about how the strike was impacting them.
In just 6 days, the campaign proved how badly youth wanted to engage. These numbers showed us how much students cared about the teachers and their education, and we were thrilled that we could provide a platform for students to showcase their raw and authentic opinions.
Our campaign generated over 65,800 views on Instagram, 1,300 interactions, 147 followers all in just 6 days ( we started this on October 20 2025 and the day I’m writing this is October 26 2025). We received dozens of powerful letters from students aged 6 to 18 across the entire province.
What do these letters really tell us?
These letters weren’t just angry rants about the government (actually no, if I’m being 100% honest there were a couple rants here and there). However, in terms of the majority of them, we could clearly feel the emotional weight of the situation:
- The Anxiety for the Future: We’re reading letters from students terrified about diploma exams, stressing over university applications, and feeling like they’re falling behind.
- The Emotional Weight: Many youth shared feeling lost, unsupported, and stressed out by the constant instability in their learning environment.
- The Passion: Despite the frustration, the letters show how deeply students care about their teachers, their schools, and the quality of their education.
A Challenge to Every single person reading this post.
Your voice is your most powerful tool!
Talking from experience, you don’t need years of experience or a massive budget to launch an impactful project. If you have an idea, you just need a platform (even a simple Google Form or a strong social media presence) and the drive and disciple to keep you moving.
We are so grateful for the initial boost from amazing organizations like Youth Central, advocates like Evan Li and many other accounts such as:
- @protectpubliceducationab
- @airdrieboardofyouthaffairs
- @albertastudentstrikewalkout
- @ab.students.for.teachers
Now we want to hear YOUR voice. Before the strike ends, write a letter (even as short as 2 sentences) about what YOU feel about the strike. Your voice is incredibly important and we want to amplify as many as possible. Even if you don’t want to (it takes less than 3 minutes), at least do the bare minimum of sharing it with a friend or sibling (under the age of 18).
Like the campaign says, your voice matters! As students, we should actively take control of the situations happening around us each and every day (especially in times like this).
Here is the link to write your letter today!: https://forms.gle/9MpGBc3fEuwz5Ac59
Link to check out our campaign on Instagram!
https://www.instagram.com/your.voice.matters.ab/