SUDBURY -- Following the fifth strike by education workers across the province, union officials say support is growing and morale is high as planned job action continues.

Following the fifth strike by education workers across the province, union officials say support is growing as job action continues.

Despite negotiations stalling between the Ontario Secondary Teachers Federation and the provincial government, morale among education workers in Sudbury remains high.

As part of ongoing job action,the OSSTF has announced that it will hold another one-day strike on Jan. 21, its sixth walkout after talks broke down in Dec.. Union officials say it will be the last full withdrawal of services until after the high school exam period.

Members from the Near North District School Board will be taking part again next week along with eight other boards from across the province.

This following the recent strike Wednesday where for the second time since last month, teachers and support staff in Sudbury held another one-day walkout as part of the continuing weekly rotating strikes across the province.

Eric Laberge is the OSSTF District 3 president. He says that despite the setbacks, morale amongst his members remains positive.

"The fact that they are rotating makes them more manageable for all our members and the point that we’re going to stop clearly is when we have a negotiated settlement," said Laberge.

Amongst the top concerns teachers have are increased class sizes, frozen wages, as well as the introduction of mandatory online learning.

Nickel Belt MPP France Gelinas says that she fears with many of her constituents residing in rural communities, they will be unable to keep up online.

"They are worried about what it will mean," Gelinas says. "People who live in Whitefish, Cartier, Onaping, all of them have a really tough time getting onto the internet. When they are told that their kids will be forced to be learning through the internet, this is a non-starter for them. We can’t even get cell service. We can’t even get a decent internet provider. How are those children supposed to learn?"

Gelinas says that most people who have reached out to her have voiced their support for the education workers. She’s optimistic the walk-outs will have an impact.

"I can see that more and more people understand what’s at play and more and more people are sending a clear message to Mr. Ford and the Minister of Education that education matters, and that class sizes matters, and that choices for e-learning matter," said Gelinas.

For the Rainbow District School Board alone, approximately 4,500 students were impacted by Wednesday’s walkouts.

While Education Minister Stephen Lecce has said that the walkouts are only hurting students, Laberge argues the long-term impact of the proposed cuts are far worse.

"I think that the damage to students is minimal at best because they aren’t ongoing and prolonged strikes," says Laberge. "But at the same time we want to make sure that we continue to apply pressure to the government to get back to the table and bargain in a fair manner."

Joining the picket lines in the Sudbury area was OSSTF Vice-President Paul Caccamo. He says internal polling shows strong support for the educators.

"It’s been pretty clear through the consultations that we’ve engaged with and the polling that we’ve engaged in that the public is not happy with how the government has handled the education file. So, yes, that gives rise to some optimism that eventually, like almost all governments do where they see where public opinion rests, that they will change or correct the errors in their ways," said Caccamo.

Support staff workers were also outside Wednesday.

Christine Goudreau is the president of OSSTF District 31, representing support staff from both local French school boards. She says while they have heard some complaints, they feel supported by the community.

"We still have support, we still have honks. We still have people reacting to it. They still want to encourage us because we want to get the students back in and give them what they deserve," said Goudreau.