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By Josh Hall | @Vancan19

chinook's edge & wild rose also listed

Red Deer Catholic balances budget, but projections show 90 staff to be cut; ATA says gov’t must help divisions

Jun 21, 2024 | 4:24 PM

Red Deer Catholic Regional Schools (RDCRS) has found a way to balance its budget, which until recently featured a worrisome $4.2 million deficit — but, it’s going to mean significantly reducing its workforce.

This week, RDCRS topped a list — released by the Alberta Teachers’ Association (ATA) — of divisions facing staff reductions going into the 2024/25 school year.

In all, RDCRS is looking at a cut of 90.6 full-time employees (FTEs), or almost 16 per cent, from about 576 FTEs to 486. This will impact newer teachers, many of whom are still on probationary agreements.

All this while enrolment is anticipated to remain flat.

A chart provided by the Alberta Teachers’ Association showing projected cuts to teacher FTEs for the 2024/25 school year.

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Among the many divisions listed by the ATA, RDCRS is in a unique position, in that its reductions are due to what they’re calling ‘right sizing.’

As RDCRS Board Chair Murray Hollman explains, right sizing refers to correcting a mistake the division made a year ago when it over-hired because it was expecting much higher enrolment.

Hollman says the division is now owning up to that mistake, and while the ATA is pleased to hear of a balanced budget, it isn’t happy the division is doing so on the backs of teachers and students.

“As a new teacher, it’s heartbreaking because you go to university, you start working and it’s what you want to do. If a board is struggling to do their finances, they need to work with the government to get assistance,” says Jason Schilling, ATA president.

“We know boards are dealing with other economic pressures with transportation, the cost of gas, inflation, and insurance is up a lot, but again, the government is responsible for the funding of those things.”

Though the ATA’s message is largely directed at the province, Schilling says that at least partially in Red Deer Catholic’s case, it’s pointed at the division.

“We overestimated, we have the part we played. We’ve always seen growth, we’ve always had the reserves; we got into a little bit of hot water this year, [but] we’ve learned from our mistake,” Hollman says.

“The ministry [of education] has a tough job. Costs have gone up so much. I don’t envy them because I know they’re in a tough spot to try and make decisions on where to allocate money.”

There’s no question, Hollman adds, that RDCRS could use more cash, but everyone has a part to play in finding solutions.

The reality for school divisions is that budget and staffing change projections in June don’t necessarily reflect what the change will be, positive or negative, come September when divisions finalize enrolment and know who they actually need to hire.

Such is true for Red Deer Catholic, though Hollman says it’s hard to say right now where they’ll actually land given the currently high projected reduction.

But for Chinook’s Edge School Division (CESD), currently looking at a drop of two, they could well be in the positive by a handful, according to Superintendent Kurt Sacher.

“In a school division of 600 teachers, there’s always been 20-25 who either retire or move, says Sacher, calling a change of two ‘negligible’ and noting that no one in their case is being fired.

“Chinook’s Edge is looking at a deficit a little over $500,000 right now, but in a $140 million budget, that isn’t significant. We will settle in pretty close to balanced. We’re keeping class sizes at targets we’ve had for the last 12 years and we feel confident in where we are.”

Sacher acknowledges the ATA is just trying to speak up and show it wants what’s best for teachers.

Although the ATA’s information begs a lot of questions of certain divisions, including Hollman’s, he knows the ATA is just trying to lobby the government to make life better for teachers and students.

“We will see numbers change in the fall,” says the ATA’s Schilling, “but part of the problem is planning, and if I’m a teacher who’s being let go in June, but the division is saying they may be able to hire me back in the fall, I still have to make plans for what I want to do with my life. A division can’t guarantee people will be around to pick up those jobs.”

It also affects how class lists are sorted out in the early summer, how big class sizes will be, and even creates space issues if classes must be split.

The fact is, Schilling says, a lot of boards are making cuts due to financial constraints, and, in his words, the buck stops with the province.

“Ultimately, the government is responsible for funding public education. They’ve underfunded education for years, specifically the UCP which kept the education budget flat through the pandemic, even though we saw tens of thousands of new students,” says Schilling.

“They implemented a weighted moving average, which isn’t meeting the needs of school boards to fund schools. Then you have outlier school boards who make mistakes unfortunately. Right sizing affects how they deliver services. You have the same number of students, in Red Deer Catholic’s case, but 90 less teachers, and that’s going to change class sizes and programming.”

Hollman tells rdnewsNOW that in the last month, Red Deer Catholic has seen a sudden registration influx of about 100 students.

He says although the teacher cuts are the main source of getting to a balanced budget, and perhaps a small surplus, the division is also looking at other efficiencies, such as how it utilizes wellness workers.

“There wasn’t any stone left unturned when we looked at the budget this spring,” Hollman says. “Losing teachers is always the last thing we want because it affects the classrooms the most. The picture gets painted as if staff are just numbers to us, but there are names and faces to those people, and they are some of the toughest decisions I’ve dealt with in my tenure since 2013.

“We are committed to making sure we dont see big losses like this again.”

The ATA’s chart also lists Wild Rose School Division at a reduction of 3.3 FTEs.

In a statement to rdnewsNOW, Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides says, “School boards have the autonomy and accountability to manage their budgets and the hiring of staff to reflect and support the local needs of their communities and students. In most cases, staffing decisions are a reflection of increasing or decreasing enrolment.”

The government is making record investments in education that will support the hiring of more than 3,000 teachers, EAs and educational staff, Nicolaides says, referring to the election promise noted by the ATA in its release.

“This will] ensure every student has the support they need to succeed in the classroom,” says the minister. “I’m always open to talking with our school boards and make improvements as necessary.”

rdnewsNOW did ask the education ministry about the ATA’s claims that Alberta spends the least of all provinces on public education, and that Alberta has the highest ratio of students to teachers in the country.

The ministry says the government has increased spending to education by nearly $400 million this year alone, and will boost spending by $1.2 billion to address ‘classroom complexity’ over three years.

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