Support staff strikes expose urgent need
By Lethbridge Herald on February 24, 2025.
CATHARINE KAVANAGH – TROY MEDIA
Albertans are understandably frustrated with the ongoing support staff strike in Edmonton-area public schools. This frustration is especially acute for parents of students with learning disabilities or challenges—the very children who suffer most when their educational assistants are on the picket lines.
One significant reason a strike leaves so many Alberta students in limbo is that nearly 93 per cent of them attend public schools. Consequently, when this single sector experiences a strike, the majority of students are affected.
However, Alberta parents could regain control if they had access to a greater number of affordable learning options.
More options would lead to increased accountability across all schools, whether public, charter or independent. When educational institutions and their leaders recognize the existence of numerous alternatives, they are compelled to be entrepreneurial, innovative and responsive to parental needs. Empowered with choices, parents can select alternative schools or learning environments that best suit their children.
In essence, accountability ensures that schools always have a contingency plan—something notably absent during the current strike—or risk losing students. For instance, in 2020, 84 per cent of independent schools missed no more than three days of classes during the initial COVID-19 closures, whereas public schools struggled to adapt.
Regardless of strikes, a system offering a diverse array of school types provides parents with the maximum ability to choose the optimal learning environment for their children. This could encompass trades-based learning, small-group instruction, sports- or dance-focused curricula, or self-paced education, among other options. Children are not one-size-fits-all; therefore, our education system shouldn’t be either.
Of course, true empowerment for parents and genuine accountability are only possible when this wide variety of schooling options is accessible to everyone. Currently, with educational assistants on strike, students with disabilities or learning challenges have been instructed to stay home. Some children attend school only two days per week; others are home full-time. This situation has cornered parents, many of whom have had to take time off work or scramble to arrange work-from-home setups.
Ultimately, it’s the children who lose the most. Families suing the provincial government over the strike have a valid point: their children’s right to an education is being violated. Missing an entire month of school equates to 12 per cent of the academic year. No child can forgo 12 per cent of classes and still receive the same quality of education.
While Alberta boasts one of the most pluralistic education systems in the country, it remains insufficiently broad and deep to ensure true accessibility. Independent schools can be prohibitively expensive. Charter schools are not available everywhere and often have long waitlists. Home education is a commitment that not all parents are willing or able to make. Establishing new independent or charter schools involves months of applications and bureaucratic hurdles.
This scenario perpetuates a vastly unequal system. Wealthy families have their own options during this strike: hiring nannies, paying for private tutoring, or transferring their children to elite schools. However, we at Cardus envisions a society where a responsive, best-fit education is available to all children, regardless of family wealth.
Practically speaking, this means Alberta should encourage the establishment of new independent and charter schools—last year’s funding announcement for capital costs is a commendable start—and streamline the process without sacrificing appropriate oversight. Such measures would inspire more program diversity, expand the availability of these options, and ensure that any strike doesn’t automatically impact 93 per cent of students.
Realistically, enrolment won’t become more balanced, parents won’t have choices, and schools won’t be driven to innovate until these alternatives become more affordable. Currently, Alberta funds independent schools at 70 per cent of public school operational funding. This leaves a 30 per cent gap, plus all capital costs, which parents must cover through tuition or fundraising. As a result, even the most modest and affordable independent schools remain beyond the financial reach of many families.
There’s a better way—one that doesn’t force students and families to accept the loss of more than a tenth of the school year. By giving control back to parents, expanding educational options, and making them accessible and affordable, public schools will be prompted to make their own improvements, benefiting everyone.
Catharine Kavanagh is the western stakeholder director at Cardus, a non-partisan think tank.
The views, opinions and positions expressed by all Troy Media columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of Troy Media.
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Intead of commodifying public services like education and health, so the favoured in our society can profit, perhaps we could simply adequately fund the public system?
You have a libertarian government starving the public system and then justifying a (publically financed) private system because the public one has been starved. The bonus is that you can stratify the system to provide better service to the worthy and leftovers for the hoi polloi.
bravo!
Some very good points brought forward in your opinions and I agree with many of them.
Unfortanetly we are going to continue to see staffing shortages across all areas of employment because the baby boomers are all retiring and no one is there to replace them. The warnings have been made for over 30 years of the impending crisis which would impact all sectors, but no one prepared, as usual and ingored the warnings.
“. . .One industry that will be especially hit as baby boomers retire is health care; think doctors, nurses, and home aides. Almost one out of every four health care workers is over the age of 55, so as those workers retire, their jobs will need to be filled.Jul 29, 2024 . . .”
https://abc7.com/post/baby-boomer-retirement-wave-means-more-career-opportunities/15115356/#:~:text=One%20industry%20that%20will%20be,will%20need%20to%20be%20filled.
Every political party in power as government in Canada suffers from shortages, and throwing more money at the problem will solve the issue.
We need to find ways to work more efficiently! Strikes are hurting society, but the ‘pigs at the trough’ unions do not care about society, only themselves, as we have observed over the last 18 months with major strikes in the transportation of goods, healthcare, and education. Canadians are already overloaded from inflation in food, housing costs, and increased service costs, but unions so not care that every raise they get is passed on to the taxpayer and consumer. Unions only care about themselves!
Canada Post is losing $1.3 billion a year, and even more after the recent strike and raises. Will the service be better? Of course not! In fact after the last strike, many have not returned to Canada Post and now use more dependable couriers.
More money will not solve the issue and until we can replace the large workforce retiring, we need to find ways to work better!
Maybe, as the Boomers leave the workforce, employers will have to start treating employees better (with or without a union).
Privatizing education will lower the quality for all but the privileged, as investors want competitive profits. And even the privileged can experience poor outcomes. A cousin of mine went to the top private schools in Calgary where the teachers earned less than their public counterparts, and many lacked appropriate credentials. But they could afford tutors to accomodate for cost-cutting in the for-profit system.
support staff are not paid a living wage. there are many jobs that pay more per hour that do not require any post secondary investment. it is shameful. moreover, the ed-system fails without good support staff.
I strongly disagree with my tax dollars supporting private or any religious school system. Our public system has been grossly underfunded and the frontline employees have been underpaid for as long as I remember. The current CUPE strike is completely justified. Like Smith trying to privatize our health system she is trying to do the same with our education system. Hopefully the mismanagement of the health system and the related current scandal will drum her and her fellow accomplices out of office. Those that want private schools can fully fund it themselves and send ur kids to ur elite schools so they don’t have to mingle with the common folk.
All commenters have valid points. There are only three ways to raise the money to meet the demands of the public. Taxes, borrow it or print it. None are good options. Efficiencies is.