For many kids, the Science Week is most notable for two things: the Daleks and panning for gold and sapphires at the Geoscience Open Day. Yet anyone who didn’t see the ads saying that the Geoscience day was “postponed” until October probably had some very disappointed kids on Sunday.
Some were no doubt doubly disappointed if they were caught out by the World of Science show not being on on the Sunday either – the Science Week dates ran until Sunday 24th, but unless you had a magnifying glass to help you read the calendar in the Canberra Times liftout, you would have missed that the WOS only went until Saturday.
The Canberra Times has shed some light on the Geoscience problems today – it was a staff v management dispute.
Management claimed “it has become clear in recent days that we just weren’t going to have enough staff present on the day”. But staff said “the open day was cancelled after management discovered union members planned to distribute leaflets and balloons calling for ‘fair pay at GA’.”
Seems there’s a lot of demand for these folk over in the mines, and the pay disjunct is taking a toll on those left behind.
And in case anyone from Geoscience is reading, when you do hold the Open Day in future, could you please move the gold panning ponds from the cold shaded south side of the building to that lovely warm northern side? The kids end up very wet and frozen.
UPDATED: The ABC reports on GA staff protesting.
Loading ...
