With class size in the spotlight, incoming school trustees say fix could be in non-traditional spaces

Several incoming public school trustees say that if Alberta increased funding to hire more teachers, the Calgary Board of Education could immediately start hiring and find creative, non-traditional places for those classrooms. 

“School boards know how to allocate that money,” said Susan Vukadinovic, re-elected to represent wards 8 and 9 in south-central Calgary.

Vukadinovic said there is extra space in some schools for another classroom. Otherwise, the CBE has also doubled up classrooms in the past, where two classes with two teachers share one room.

Calgary’s public school system also uses non-traditional spaces, when necessary.

“For example, Joane Cardinal Schubert High School currently has some of their classes located at the YMCA next door,” she said. “Our four outreach high schools are all located in commercial buildings, [and] two years ago, Connaught School moved their Grade Sixes to a nearby office building.”

Classroom size has been a point of contention during the teachers’ strike. Teachers have asked for a cap, aligning with previously developed targets, but Premier Danielle Smith said Alberta can’t do that because it doesn’t have enough schools to accommodate the classes. 

A sea of red near downtown Calgary on Oct. 9, at a rally of striking teachers and their supporters. (Colleen Underwood/CBC)

The province has promised 100 new and updated schools across the province over the next seven years, trying to keep up with demand in a booming province.

In Calgary, five incumbent public school trustees were re-elected, along with two new faces: Jenny Regal and Cynthia Cordova.

CBC Calgary reached out to all of them to ask about their expectations for the term, and what they learned while campaigning. They will be sworn in and elect a chair on Oct. 31.

Advocating for schools and higher per student funding

Laura Hack, a former teacher, was re-elected for wards 3 and 4 in north central Calgary and said CBE can be creative about finding new space.

Because of the tremendous growth in Calgary, she said her key issue heading into this term is advocating for new schools in her area, and lobbying to address per student funding. 

“We could lower the ratios. We could right now if we had the funding to do so,” she said. 

“The CBE gets $10,342 per student. Looking across Canada … we are so very low. … Class sizes are affected when we get that thin.”

The Alberta Teachers’ Association and the Fraser Institute have said Alberta’s per student funding is the lowest in Canada. Statistics Canada makes the calculations slightly differently, and has Alberta as among the lowest.

Previously, public CBE advocacy documents have estimated it would cost $1 billion to bring per student funding in Alberta to the national average.

Jenny Regal is a retired teacher who has been elected to serve as CBE school trustee for wards 1 and 2. (Elise Stolte/CBC)

Jenny Regal, a retired teacher newly elected to represent wards 1 and 2, also flagged advocating for funding as a priority. She joined the teachers protest at the legislature in Edmonton on Thursday and said she remembers going on strike in 2002 for the same reasons: chronic underfunding and a lack of support to deal with complexity in the classroom. 

“[Kids with unique learning needs] are the kinds of kids that start falling through the cracks and that’s what causes moral distress,” she said.

Transparency and releasing class size data

Regal said she has a lot to learn as she takes on this new role. One thing she’d like to find out is if the school district can better support teachers as they continue to develop unit plans to align with new curriculum.

And she wants to make sure there are public conversations about funding, space and other challenges schools face. For example, the school board should be tracking and releasing data on class sizes, she said.

“Everyone needs to know what exactly is going on. Because they’ll understand then what the fight is about,” she said.

Class size data has been contentious in the past. Alberta used to have class size targets, but frequently failed to meet them. In 2019, the province stopped requiring school boards to measure and publicly report this.

Vukadinovic hesitated when asked if she would support releasing local class size data.

“What I think is important is how do we maintain confidence so parents continue to choose public education,” she said.

“I do want to reassure parents, even with below-average funding we achieve above-average results. When parents send their kids to public schools in Alberta, they are getting a quality education. … Our students outperform the provincial average on every single diploma exam.” 

Susan Vukadinovic, left, and Nancy Close are both re-elected public trustees in Calgary. (Submitted by Nancy Close and Susan Vukadinovic)

Re-elected trustee Nancy Close, representing central south wards 11 and 13, said she supports collecting and releasing the local class size data, especially after reflecting on all she heard from voters during this campaign.

Some of those conversations were on hot-button issues such as books in the library, pronoun use and gender identity.

There can be a tension for trustees wanting both transparency and a strong relationship with the province. Releasing class size data could be seen as political advocacy, and in the past, trustees have emphasized the value of doing advocacy behind closed doors.

But Close said, “We need to be better at communicating what CBE does and what our role is.”

“School boards are non-partisan. They’re partners with the provincial government,” she said. “But non-partisan doesn’t mean not being political. Because for me, being political is being engaged in community and sharing information.” 

Managing complexity and unique student needs 

Patricia Bolger was re-elected to represent wards 6 and 7 in west and central Calgary. She’s a former teacher who served as board chair last term. 

Patricia Bolger was re-elected as trustee for the Calgary Board of Education. (Patricia Bolger, LinkedIn)

Bolger served on the provincial taskforce on aggression and classroom complexity earlier this year, and is expecting a report on that to be released shortly. She said CBE currently diverts $50 million from the general student budget to support students with unique needs, both in regular classes and roughly 600 specialized classrooms.

She said if Alberta could increase funding for complex students, it would make a big difference in regular classrooms.

Cynthia Cordova, a new trustee representing wards 5 and 10 in northeast Calgary, was a trustee for two terms in Ontario before moving here, where her youngest daughter is now finishing high school. 

Despite the larger classes here, she said the Calgary school system is doing a better job of preparing her daughter for university than Ontario’s. 

She hopes to encourage the CBE to be more transparent by making the information they already release easier to navigate and understand, and she is looking forward to working through the budget.

Tracking the impact of gender, pronoun regulations

The final trustee is Charlene May, who was re-elected to represent wards 12 and 14 in Calgary’s deep south. She has a background in oilfield reclamation and running a day home for kids.

Charlene May was re-elected public trustee in Calgary’s deep south. (Submitted by Charlene May)

During the campaign, she spent time answering questions about book lists and restrictions, parental notification of pronoun use, opt-in requirements for sex-ed, and the ban on transgender athletes in girls’ sport.

The board of trustees wasn’t consulted on these provincial regulations, she said, but what they can do going forward is ensure schools remain welcoming spaces for all students. And they can track the impacts. 

“Even internally, are we tracking how many are not opting in?” she said.

“Are we still seeing girls’ sports at the same amount? Are we still seeing the uptake? Or are we seeing kids scared to go because they might now need birth registration? … Do we need to change our policy so this is monitored because it has never really needed to be a thing?”

CBC News is reaching out to Catholic trustees next.