The Current - Why are Alberta's teachers on strike?

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

51,000 teachers in Alberta are on strike, demanding solutions to what they say is an overcrowded and underfunded education system. We hear from teachers and experts on the state of education in Alberta today, and what needs to happen to give students the best learning environment possible.

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That's vote.com. Thanks for listening. This is a CBC podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, and this is the current podcast. For this week, at least, Calgary High School student, Felix Ocampo, is enjoying the Alberta teacher strike. I've been, like, inviting my friends over. We just had a sleep over. And I guess, like, just going places.

like going out every day. We just wanted a sunrise hike up Nose Hill. It's Nose Hill Park for any non-Calgarians who are listening. 51,000 teachers in Alberta walked off the job on Monday after rejecting two offers from the province. It is the largest labor walkout in the province's history. More than 700,000 students are out of class. Sunrise hikes and sleepovers aside, Felix hopes this strike end soon. If we're not back by next Monday or Tuesday, that's when I'm going to start getting more concerned about missing stuff. and not being prepared for next year in grade 12. The teachers are asking for higher wages and better working conditions.

The government's latest offer, rejected in a vote by the teachers, included a 12% wage increase over four years and the hiring of 3,000 more teachers to reduce overcrowded classrooms. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said the province's offer was fair. What you need to do is have a reasonable and fair pay settlement, which we do. What we've put on the table would make teachers the highest paid in Western Canada, particularly after provincial taxes

because we've got such a great tax advantage. But we think that the issue is how do we deal with aggression in the classroom, complexity in the classroom. David Clyman teaches grade 10 to 12 science in Calgary, and he says for him, the strike is not about pay. For me personally, this has almost nothing to do with a salary. I'm watching my colleagues, even long-term experience colleagues, being given burnout working conditions and schedules.

it is beyond unacceptable what I've seen in my classroom of 41 kids in each class. I do as much as I can to get to know my students and support my students, but I know that I can't do my job to the best of my own ability under these working conditions. And that's what we're fighting for. Morgan Spooner is an elementary school teacher in a small town in central Alberta. She joined the walkout on Monday morning. Morgan, good morning. Good morning.

You wrote a Facebook post to, as you say, help people better understand what's happening inside our classrooms every day. So take me inside your classroom. You work in a rural school. What grades do you teach? This year I'm teaching a grade two class in a rural school in central Alberta, where I started the year with 27 students in my class. Okay. What is it like in that classroom on a regular day? Just paint us a picture of what it's like?

I think overall, so my class does not have any EA support. So what that looks like is an overcrowded space. It looks like students asking for help that aren't receiving it because there just simply isn't time to reach every student throughout the day. Is that the biggest challenge that you face, just being stretched in 27 different directions at once? I think that's one of the biggest challenges that most teachers are facing is an overcrowded classroom. I think they're facing, you know, loss of connection from their students.

I think teachers are facing aggression. And I think that without a class cap put in, that teachers won't be able to further enrich learning in the classroom. How big of an issue is that, I mean, we've talked about this before in the program, that issue of aggression in the classroom. How big of an issue is that for you? I think in my personal classroom, it's not something that's as present this year as it has been in past. I do see my colleagues, though, who struggle with students who are aggressive towards them or their peers. We heard the premier, Danielle Smith, talk about classroom complexity. You wrote in that Facebook post that the needs of your students grow more complex by the year.

What does that look like? I mean, to describe that complexity as you see it. So I think that part of that complexity is looking at learning deficits and students who are excelling. So within a classroom, you can have five different grade levels of students. And those just the basic learning complexities are a lot to prep materials for, to teach materials, to meet students where they're at, which is really what teachers are trying to do is meet them where they're at, build those foundational skills. scaffold that up to, up to grade level or extend it beyond grade level. And I just think that's not possible when you're one person in a room of 27, 30, 40 students. What does that like for you as a teacher? I mean, you go into this profession with the goal, as you say, of trying to meet those

students where they're at. If you can't do that, just personally, what does that like for you? I think it definitely, so for sure, teachers don't go into teaching, expecting to become rich. We all go in there with the heart and intention of, you know, enriching, supporting, challenging kids. And so when you're not able to do that as a teacher, it's quite defeating. And I think that, you know, you come home and you try to spend time to figure out how you can reach that student, how you can enrich that student or support that student. And oftentimes it becomes very consuming and defeating. 90% of teachers voted against the provincial governments.

second offer, which would have seen 3,000 more teachers hired across the 2,500 schools in the province. If you're listening, you might think that 3,000 additional teachers could sound like a lot. Why was that turned down, do you think? Sure. So I guess what I'll say is it's similar to, I'll give you an analogy of a brick wall. So teachers are stacking bricks to build this strong wall, one for reading, one for math, connection, etc. every year. But these bricks have been taken away. So we have fewer supports. We have large class sizes, we have less time and less help, and the wall can't stand strong forever. So I think this strike really is just about saying to the government, to the public, that

we need the right materials before this wall collapses. And some of those right materials are hiring more teachers and having support staff such as educational assistance. And when you look at those numbers, basically, from my perspective, what you're seeing is potentially 0.5 of a teacher up to maybe 0.7 of a teacher per school. And I think what that's saying is that teaching and learning is a lottery. Who's the lucky grade level that's going to receive that teacher or EA? Who's lucky students that are going to get that? And I just don't stand with thinking that teaching and learning is a lottery pick. Each student should be supported no matter their ability, background age. I think all students need to be supported. Would there be a material difference your

union is asking for at least 5,000 more teachers to meet the provincial class size recommendations? Would 5,000 more teachers make a material difference in terms of what you're describing? I don't think I feel comfortable putting a direct number on it. I don't feel like that's within my role to assume, I think just talking about what has been offered and not maybe making guesses at it would just offer better perspective to the public. What about pay? The province's second offer would have seen a 12% pay increase over four years. Your union, the Alberta Teachers Association, the ATA proposed a 34.5% pay increase over the same period, although they said that was the starting port for negotiations. The Premier has

said that the offer that the province is making would make you the best paid teachers in Western Canada. How much of this is about pay? For me personally, I don't think a lot of this is about pay. I would much prefer to go to a work environment that is, you know, a little bit less chaotic, less dysregulated. I would prefer to see my students have an EA in the classroom. I would prefer them to have access to proper materials.

So I don't think I'm alone in saying that I don't think a lot of teachers are necessarily looking for a huge pay increase. Would it be nice to be fairly compensated for our work? Yes. But if I had to choose, I would choose to have better supports within education. How big of an issue is burnout in your, not just in your school, but in your own thinking around teaching? We've talked about this. Again, this is an issue teacher burnout across this country. For you, what does that mean?

Yeah, for me it means like you can't ask somebody to continue to do more with less and less and less every year. I think especially in rural education, you see a lot of burnout just in the fact that we do teach a lot of split classes. which means different curriculums. You have a teacher teaching maybe right up to six different classes or curriculums per day. And so eventually you just can't keep up with the needs of that. And I think burnout is a very real thing for teachers. Many teachers like yourself are also parents. How are you thinking about all of this as it relates to you have a couple of kids?

Yeah, I have two kids. Yeah. How are you thinking about this when it comes to their experience in school? So I'm very fortunate that I'm able to work alongside my children through their learning journey. And I just think that I have two very different children at home. As a parent, when looking at my children, I have one child who would need enrichment. And unfortunately in a classroom of 30 kids, that's not going to be possible with one teacher for him. So now that's something that we're working on at home.

And as a parent, it is my shared responsibility to work through education with my children. However, when I look at that and think if he's not able to get enrichment, I look at the other side of that and think who's not able to get intervention in his class, who's not able to get the support that they need? And for my other child, who maybe requires some wellness assistance, we have one wellness worker for 400 students in our classroom. And so, sorry, 400 students within our school. And so it's just not possible for him to receive maybe some of those supports that he would need on a regular basis, which then when I'm looking at that, there's other teachers who need to take their kids for private

private assistance or other parents who need to take their kids for private assistance because the resources just aren't there. I have to let you go. But, I mean, let me just ask you very briefly. Labor disruptions are meant to be disruptive. I mean, that's about putting pressure on the employer.

This has been disruptive. The provincial government is offering something like $30 a day per child to families of children, age 12 and younger, whose classes are canceled, just to offset child care costs. What would you say to parents who are trying to figure out how they're going to balance work in child care? They might not support the strike, but they're caught up in this as well.

What would you say to them? I would just say to parents that I know that this is a difficult time right now for everybody financially. There's a huge financial burden that comes from this for all. And I would just tell them to hold in there and know that teachers are standing up and fighting for their children, putting in the good fight for all kids. Morgan, good to talk to you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Morgan Spooner is an elementary school teacher in central Alberta. We asked for an interview with the education minister for the province.

He wasn't available. The office of Alberta's minister of treasury board and finance sent us a statement it reads in part in order to get a deal. The Alberta Teachers Association must show up to the bargaining table for formal negotiations like they've been asked to a deal can't get done with the ATA refusing to get back to the formal bargaining table. The statement also added that the Alberta Teachers Association has never formally proposed adding 5,000 new teachers. And until they do, the government is unable to consider that

proposal. Hello, I'm Jess Milton, host of the podcast backstage at the Vinyl Cafe. Join us every Friday for funny, fictional, feel-good family stories about Dave, his wife Morley, and their kids, Sam and Stephanie. And for behind-the-scenes stories about what it's like to live life out on the road, on a tour bus, living out of a suitcase, traveling across. Canada. New episodes every Friday. Subscribe for free wherever you get your podcasts. Darrell Hunter is a professor at the University of Alberta, specializing in education policy. He's in Edmonton. Daryl, good morning to you. Good morning. As a former teacher, do you understand why teachers in your province are frustrated when it comes to class sizes? Yes, particularly

as being a former high school teacher and middle years teacher. To have, you know, 40 or so students in the classrooms I taught would have been very onerous. Can you just paint a picture as you understand it of what's going on in the province? The Alberta government's own recommendations are that kindergarten through grade three classes have an average of 17 children, grade four through six, an average of 23 children, junior high, 25 students, high school classes have an average of 27 students. Now, the Alberta government actually stopped counting class sizes in 2019. but what do we know about where the trend is going? I think it's fairly clear that the student teacher ratio is increasing here in Alberta.

When you're talking about the student teacher ratio, it's always important to remember that you can have an identical ratio sitting on the table and it will be viewed differently by teachers than it will be by public. administrators. So a student teacher ratio is generally considered as a measure of workload by teachers. More students per teacher, the greater the workload. The identical ratio viewed in a very different fashion by public administrators, it's a measure of educational system efficiency. So they generally would see increased ratio as being more desirable because that indicates that the public's tax dollars are being more

efficiently spent. What do we know about what that means in the classroom? If you have a larger class size, what does that mean when it comes to students and their ability to learn? A complex answer to your question. I think we've got probably in the neighborhood of 50 to 70 years of research into people teacher ratios and its impact on student performance, generally speaking, and I think we all recognize this, that at the elementary level, getting those young students reading and writing is a complex business, and they try to keep ratios lower at kindergarten through to grade three, but they tend to go upward as you go up through the system to the high school level.

for a variety of reasons, but it's mainly for efficiency sake, I think when you get to the high school level that the ratios increase. So when you hear someone like Morgan talking about teaching 27 kids in a class and she feels that she's pulled in 27 different directions, what does that mean for those students? As you understand it, what's the material impact on those students? the material impact on students fundamentally is less time for a teacher to interact with an individual student because you have more students in a fixed amount of time and if you're trying to interact with that student teach that student develop their reading ability or their numeracy skills you just have less time to devote to a greater number of students do we know how long that impact lasts? The impact of what? Well, the impact of just not having enough time with the teacher, that you have less

face time, if I can put it that way. That might be in the moment if you're in a grade three or grade four class. How long does the impact of that follow you? Well, if a student is not learning to read and write, that will delay their progress through the school system. and conceivably have very long impact beyond school itself. Do we have evidence about grades? I mean, part of this is about learning,

but people like to measure things with grades as well. Do we have evidence that smaller class sizes will improve grades? About 50 years of research that shows that reducing class size, particularly at the elementary level, is desirable. And I think most people understand that intuitively. That's why you've got elementary schools, smaller elementary schools, and smaller people teacher ratios, you know, across Canada, these schools are located in the suburbs. When you get to the high school level, you get larger types of collegiate institutes and larger schools congregating more students

and they're generally speaking, I think, further away from home. So there's a general understanding there already of the importance of school size, but also classroom size and the learning of students. I have to let you go, but you've talked about the financial considerations here. The province says it's investing billions of dollars in building new schools to accommodate a growing population. The class size caps aren't on the table. what sort of, if you were to increase the number of teachers there and reduce that ratio, what would that mean on the education budget, do you think?

Well, here in Alberta, the government's announced that it's going to be spending $11.1 billion in capital construction building schools. As immigration patterns continue to have more. schools meeting the needs of students who are coming into Alberta as well as those students who are already here. But that's on the capital side of the ledger. Really, the negotiations here are on what we'd call the operational side. I'm thinking he has an accountant with the operational side, which basically revolves around teacher salaries, which comprise, depending on what you include in the

that formula, 85 to 90% of the cost of operating a school. Darrell, we'll leave it there. We're out of time, but we will continue to watch this. As I said, there's a lot of students and teachers who are out of the class right now and people trying to figure out what the path forward is. Thank you very much. Thank you. Darrell Hunter is an education professor at the University of Alberta. He was in Edmonton. You've been listening to the current podcast. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you soon. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca.

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