A petition to refund tuition fees for Brock students forced to take classes online has racked up almost 2,000 signatures in the course of one day.
Second-year kinesiology student Austin Hurley said he started the petition after spending two-thirds of his entire university career trying to learn a practical trade from online materials, navigating frequent server crashes and email delays, while finding that much of the learning materials have been replaced by third-party content that cuts lectures short.
"We are paying full price for a partial service," said Hurley to Thoroldnews.com.
"I feel like I am missing out on a lot."
Having done like many other Brock students affected by the pandemic, Hurley moved home to his parents to save money, while trying to keep up with the studies that he hopes will lead to some form of an internship with a sports organization.
But being out of all in-class teaching, which includes practice exams, Hurley says the whole experience is making him unsure of what to do with his studies moving forward as he feels what he is learning isn't sufficient.
Against Brock, he says, he has no resentment but says they should have prepared better for the 2020 fall semester.
"A lot of people are going to say that I'm trying to sue Brock, which I absolutely am not. I just believe we have a case," said Hurley, who says he consulted a consumer's rights attorney to verify the legitimacy of his arguments.
On the website of the petition, several Brock students are agreeing, saying the online classrooms are robbing them of their learning experience.
Brock has not yet commented on the petition.
On its website, the university said the first two weeks of February are closed for refund requests over ministry processing.
Austin Hurley says he's hoping the petition makes it clear to the university that many students are feeling a problem with the way things have been handled.
"I'm not imagining they just hand the money out to us. Maybe it should look something like discounted classes for next semester to compensate for this."
