This book presents a radical proposal: paying students to attend school. Part polemic, part movement history, and part political strategy, Wages for School Work is a rousing manifesto and call to action for disillusioned high school students fed up with cruel teachers, excessive workloads, and onerous adult expectations. Drawing on the rich history of student resistance and school strikes, it charts a new course for education—one that recognizes the countless hours students devote to studying for what it actually is: labour, arguing that like all forms of labour, schoolwork should be paid. Informed by the victories of organized labour, feminist, and anti-racist movements, Wages for School Work brings class struggle to the classroom by placing students at the center of the fight for a more just world.

The latest in ARP Books’ Semaphore Series of short polemical texts, Wages for School Work addresses disillusioned high school students, critiquing the devaluation of their labour in schools, despite their crucial role in reproducing capitalist accumulation. Raveendrabose encourages high school students to recognize that they have the power to fight not only for wages, but for structural changes to the school system.