The association representing 51,000 Alberta teachers who have been off the job since Oct. 6 says they have been asked to return to classrooms voluntarily and attend talks where class-size caps and pupil-teacher ratios were off the table.
As classes were cancelled for the ninth day for about 750,000 students, Alberta Teachers’ Association president Jason Schilling said teachers turned down a request to attend “enhanced mediation” meetings that would prevent teachers from taking any job action for a month.
Schilling said the association wouldn’t participate in what he said was a process biased in favour of employers, adding that he found the proposal insulting.
“This is one of the driving factors that teachers have been pushing for,” Schilling said at a Friday news conference. “They’ve been talking about the fact that their classrooms are overcrowded, that they do not have the resources to meet the needs of their students.”
At a news conference in response on Friday afternoon, Premier Danielle Smith said Albertans should “fully expect” legislation forcing teachers back to work during the week of Oct. 27, should the parties fail to reach a deal by the time the legislative session starts.
“We don’t want to be impacting the ability of kids to start planning for where they’re going to go to university, and it starts impacting them as soon as Grade 11 because you can get early admission into university,” she said.
The ATA hasn’t yet said whether it would challenge any back-to-work legislation in court.
A letter from the finance minister’s office on Thursday, released by the ATA, suggested that the parties submit proposals to a mediator about teacher salaries and classroom complexity. The ATA removed any signatures from the letter before its release.
Complexity refers to educator concerns about a growing number of students who need individual attention and help for needs such as learning English, behavioural challenges, mental or physical health conditions, or disabilities.
“By committing to this process, we are directing the mediator to consider the diverse causes of these complexities and consider similarly diverse solutions that could be implemented with flexibility to respond to varying needs, that are actionable within reasonable investments and resourcing, and relying on a committed partnership of the teachers, their employers,” the letter says.
“In any event, the mediator’s recommendations cannot provide for hard caps on classroom sizes or student-teacher ratios.”
The letter says the government assumes the ATA would prefer mediation over back-to-work legislation or a prolonged strike.
“As strong and free Albertans, we will not be intimidated and ruled by threats that attempt to force us back to work and away from our principles,” Schilling said, alluding to a new provincial licence plate motto unveiled on Wednesday by the premier.
At the government news conference in Calgary on Friday, Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides said he hears teachers’ concerns about class sizes and complexity, and is willing to hire more teachers and school support staff and build schools to improve conditions.
Smith said mechanisms such as class-size caps and pupil-teacher ratios deprive school boards of staffing flexibility to respond to local needs.
“Unfortunately, the ATA is fixated on a single solution, and that’s part of the problem,” she said.
In an emailed response, Schilling said the premier is oversimplifying the issue.
“Our proposal contains a solution that is tailored for Alberta’s public education system, which builds on similar approaches that other provinces have had success at,” his statement said.
Prof: Back-to-work bill could cause long-term anger
Jason Foster, a professor of labour relations and human resources at Athabasca University, said the government’s invitation was clearly unpalatable to teachers, and was more about optics than reaching a deal.
Foster said he believes the details of the letter could foreshadow what the province puts in potential back-to-work legislation for teachers.
Such legislation would demand teachers return to their duties, and would likely push the parties to binding arbitration, Foster said. The government can also determine what issues an arbitrator can and cannot address. He thinks it’s likely the government will prevent an arbitrator from considering class sizes or pupil-teacher ratios.
Although teachers could defy such an order, rebellion could result in fines for the association and even individual teachers, Foster said.
Educators could also refuse to take part in extracurricular activities if forced back to work, he said, to encourage the public to put pressure on the government.
A back-to-work law doesn’t solve the conflict, Foster said, and will likely download the problems onto a future administration to resolve.
“We will have teachers in our schools who are going to be even more angry and feeling even more disrespected by the government, and that’s going to have long-term consequences,” he said.
November diploma exams optional
Meanwhile, Alberta Education said Friday it will be optional for any student slated to write a diploma exam in November to sit for that exam.
A news release said the change was a result of the teachers’ contract dispute. January diploma exams are slated to proceed as usual, and make up 30 per cent of a student’s final grade in a diploma course required for graduation.
After voting down two contract offers in five months, teachers working in every public, Catholic, and francophone school in Alberta walked off the job on Oct. 6. Three days later, their employers locked them out.
Around 750,000 students are out of class.
Teachers are not being paid, or collecting strike pay during the lockout.
Educators say they want larger pay increases than employers have offered, to make up for a decade of relatively stagnant wages while costs rose substantially.
Employers had most recently offered a general wage increase of 12 per cent over four years, with grid adjustments in 2026 that would give some teachers additional increases.
Teachers also voted down an offer from the government to pay for 3,000 more teachers and 1,500 more educational assistants by 2028.
The ATA has said without student-teacher ratios or measures to address complexity, the problematic conditions in classrooms will persist. The association has said legal mechanisms keeping classroom makeup reasonable will protect students for perpetuity, and that time-limit promises to hire more staff will not.
Most Canadian provinces have a legal mechanism, in legislation or in the teachers’ contract, limiting class sizes and/or students with complex needs.
Jason Ellis, an associate professor in the faculty of education at the University of British Columbia, shares how B.C. has handled classroom complexity in its teachers’ contract and what to expect in Saskatchewan as teachers work to finalize theirs.
This week, the premier has floated the idea of a “complexity cap” that would add more educational assistants to schools, or striking a commission to study schools, as the Progressive Conservative government did in 2002 in response to the last widespread teachers’ strike.
