Canadians: Should education be considered an essential service and thereby limit teacher's right to strike?

It is an essential service, and I assume you're asking this because of the current Ontario teacher strike.  The problem is that  they are striking because of cuts to education by the regressive Ford conservative government.  The teachers are trying to preserve that essential service which is ranked one of the top educational systems in the world based on student academic performance. I support their right to strike.

I'm currently an landed immigrant from the US living in Nova Scotia with frequent forays into Ontario.

I am Dutch.

The only bargaining power a worker has is to withhold their labor.  If you want to limit their right to strike, you better make sure there is an independent review of their working conditions.  You would not want essential workers to look for better paying jobs or better working conditions.  At a minimum, you'd have to peg their salaries to inflation.

Secondly kids missing a week of schooling inconveniences the parents who will have to look for baby sitters for that week or take a week of work.  That week of education can be recovered by closing the school for the summer vacation a week later.  You can't do that for law enforcement or health services.

So while education is essential in many ways, you can't just take the right to strike away.  If it went beyond two weeks, you could have a point, but that means you would have to have the other conditions in place.

The problem is that then teachers would work to rule. There would be no after school activities. I'm English but now live in Canada.

The lack of the service does not endanger lives, so, no.