Education Minister Adriana LaGrange. (Government of Alberta)

By David Opinko/LethbridgeNewsNOW

Increased Student Funding

Province announces supports for students who’ve fallen behind due to pandemic disruptions

Oct 27, 2021 | 4:40 PM

The Alberta Government is taking steps to help out younger students who have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Education Minister Adriana LaGrange says they will give $490 per student to school boards whose grades have fallen behind as a result of pandemic disruptions in literacy and numeracy.

Some students may qualify for funding for both programs.

“The initial focus of this programming will be on students in Grades 2 to 3 this fall with targeted supports for students in Grade 1 starting in February of 2022 once their assessments have competed.”

It is expected that around 38,000 students in Grades 2 and 3 will receive literacy programming aid while 25,000 will get help for numeracy supports.

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LaGrange gave a few examples of what this money can be used for, including moving students to smaller groups or one-on-one supports, hiring additional staff, implementing new numeracy programming for younger learners, and improving communications with specific groups of parents.

Although funding will not be available to those in high school, the minister assured that they will take factors related to the pandemic into consideration for them as well.

“Diploma exams offer an exam-writing experience that our current Grade 12 students may not have had throughout their whole high school years. In fact, since March of their Grade 10 year, many have transitioned between in-person and online learning multiple times and may not have written an exam at all.”

In recognition of this, Grade 12 diploma exams this year will only count for 10 per cent of their final grades, compared to 30 per cent from before. Provincial Achievement Tests (PAT) will still be done as previously planned.

NDP Critic for Education Sarah Hoffman issued the following statement in response to Adriana LaGrange’s announcement on education funding:

“Education Minister Adriana LaGrange announced that the UCP government will finally be making funds available for schools that they already announced back in May.

“Let’s be clear, the $45 million being addressed today is less than 10 per cent of the $616 million they underspent last year. In the scope of the two years students and staff have been dealing with this government’s mishandling of the pandemic, it’s a drop in the bucket.

“This Minister’s approach to supporting students during the pandemic has always been behind, always been the bare minimum — which she seems dragged to step up to do — and it has resulted in school closures and chaos for classrooms.

“There is no plan here for learning. No plan to keep classrooms safe.

“Students and staff have dealt with a lot during this pandemic. This government should be focusing on the safety of classrooms, and that includes the mental health and wellbeing of students while we still deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The Minister’s announcement on changing the weighting of diploma exams does nothing to help the stress of students.

“To ensure the wellbeing of students’ mental health, the government should cancel mandatory provincial achievement tests and diploma exams for students during the remainder of the pandemic.”