Are liquor gift cards inappropriate teacher gifts?

According to Metro, this on-site promo from Ontario's liquor monopoly is not sitting well with parents:

Parents watching their kids play outside the Waterfront School at the foot of Bathurst Street on Monday afternoon were surprised by the campaign, and felt LCBO ads shouldn’t appear geared to kids. 

“Why target children?” asked a flabbergasted Jackie Allen, who was there to pick up her son Jaden, 7. “Since when is it OK for kids to give liquor to their teachers?”

The response from the LCBO, quite naturally, is that this online seasonal are not targeted to children. It's for the parents.

My wife is an elementary school teacher, and she occasionally gets LCBO gift cards from parents. It's a  welcome gift, and avoids the awkwardness of sending your child to school with a bottle of Chianti.

Perhaps the real scandal here is Metro going out of its way to manufacture outrage.

To review, here is the extent of their research:

Parents watching their kids play outside the Waterfront School at the foot of Bathurst Street on Monday afternoon were surprised by the campaign, and felt LCBO ads shouldn’t appear geared to kids.

That's right. They apparently ambushed some parents, showed them the "ad" out of context, and pressed for reactions. Poor.

Ontario teachers hijack the message on anti-union political petition

Ontario Conservative opposition leader Tim Hudak wants to redefine the job description for teachers, requiring them to spend time outside teaching hours doing extra meetings and paperwork (removing any right to work-to-rule) and changing the teacher payscale to punish those who do not "volunteer" for extracurricular activities. As the husband of a teacher (and a supporter of labour rights) I am against this. But what I'm here for is a lesson on unintended consequences in social media.

The Nepean-Carleton Progressive Conservative Riding Association have launched a petition, "Students Deserve Better," that aims to gather public support for their education platform, which will be a major issue in the upcoming election. The petition also had an invitation to send union leaders a message, which would be automatically displayed on the site. The hope was, I assume, to show a public outcry against "union bosses" (democratically elected by teachers) telling teachers to work to rule (which they had voted to do by an overwhelming majority).

The message almost immediately got hijacked by teachers:

By noon today, the comments column was completely dominated by pro-union comments like that above. Dozens of them. By 12:40, the administrator had removed the comments as well as the e-mail messaging form.

(I wish I had collected more of them before my last refresh — let me know if you have screencaps!)

The petition itself is a bit of a mess now. It doesn't even tell you how many have signed. But the easy takeover of its message, through an effort coordinated by pro-teacher social media, is a lesson some nameless political social media "guru" will not soon forget.

Teachers' union welcomes in the school year with quiz on labour rights

Clearly, no Art Directors were inconvenienced in the making of this ad. But the quiz-style long copy print ad is appearing as a full page in several Ontario dailies.

The Ontario elementary teachers (my wife is one of them) are locked in a battle of wills against the cash-strapped Ontario government. Premier Dalton McGuinty's minority government recently introduced Bill 115 to force a new contract — including wage freezes, clawbacks on bankable sick leave, and removing right to strike — on the teachers without going through the collective bargaining process. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association says it's unconstitutional, however.

I am conjugally biased on this issue, which has lead to a number of internet arguments with friends, family, and journalists. One rather disrespectful comment by the Education Minister made me so angry, I launched a petition demanding she resign or apologize for misrepresenting teachers as lazy and greedy. It has attracted almost 6,000 signatures.

I've never been a member of any union, but I find myself taking sides in this case. So,  Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario, if you'd like me to help you develop a more effective PR and social media strategy to get your story across, call me.