Catholic Advocacy

With the focus on Skilled Trades and Careers and technical education, specialized learning spaces and equipment are required.

We need new schools to have appropriate labs and learning spaces. There needs to be a monetary commitment to building appropriate spaces in existing schools.

IMR (Infrastructure Maintenance Renewal) and CMR (Capital Maintenance Renewal) funding are not addressing the maintenance needs of our aging schools. Escalating deferred maintenance needs and associated inflationary costs impede preventative maintenance on infrastructure, and even limit our ability to attend to emergent repairs.

We need IMR and CMR funding to be right-sized based on needs and costs so that we can maintain schools in a systematic way.

Modular classrooms are an important factor in being able to reduce the burden on schools with high utilization rates. The Modular Classroom Program announcements are happening at unpredictable times and result in delivery and installation delays, which are disruptive to schools. 

We need a return to Modular Classroom Program announcements in January so they can be installed and ready to operate at the beginning of the next school year. 

Our Division is at 100% overall utilization, with 50% of our schools full or over capacity.

We need more capital project approvals and timely delivery of new schools (especially in site-ready locations) to accommodate rapidly rising enrolment numbers.

The costs of fitting out new schools have increased due to both inflation and the need for specialized equipment necessary for program delivery, particularly at the high school level. We had an almost $800,000 shortfall on our last new school build.

We need the funding formula for Furniture and Equipment (F&E) to be updated to reflect present costs.

The Standards for Inclusive Education are 20 years old and do not reflect the current landscape.

We need a revision of the Standards for Inclusive Education to offer more relevant guidelines for supporting students with complex needs.

Student mental health needs are increasing at an unprecedented rate. There are incredible wait lists for students to access psychiatric care and/or crisis care. 

We need funding to ensure that students have supports, such as mental health therapists, at their school.

Strong collaboration between the Ministries of Education and Mental Health and Addictions is essential to providing a prompt and reliable spectrum of interventions for students in need of support. The number of students diagnosed with severe autism continues to increase significantly, and these students require extensive supports. We are using instructional dollars to subsidize Inclusive Education supports.

We need Inclusive Education funding that reflects the increasingly complex needs of students and allows for comprehensive supports and services for students with autism.

Demand for yellow bus service is increasing. Without additional funding to expand routes, we will need to extend run times.

We need funding to increase to enable us to add bus routes to accommodate our rapidly growing student population.

Targeted funding for Dual Credit and Skilled Trades and Careers opportunities was removed in 2019, creating a situation where school divisions must use general operational grant dollars to pay for the programs or partner with a post-secondary institution. However, there is a tuition cost that we must cover with post-secondary institutions.

We need the reinstatement of targeted dollars for each Dual Credit and Skilled Trades and Careers fast-track offering so that we can fulfill the Minister’s mandate.

Appropriate resources are important for effective and successful curriculum implementation. Hidden costs, including updates in technology, assessment, and reporting, add to this complexity. Currently, school divisions are tasked with sourcing, vetting, and paying for digital subscriptions such as Discovery Education and Edwin. This presents long-term budget implications that did not exist with textbook purchases.

We need centralized resourcing for equity in all languages across the province. We need comprehensive resources that all teachers can access and use for core subject areas to support content understanding and delivery standardization.

The Cree Language and Culture program has not been updated in many years.

We need the Cree Language and Culture program to be reviewed.

Spanish Language Arts and Ukrainian Language Arts do not reflect the new architecture and overall philosophy of the elementary curriculum. 

We need Spanish and Ukrainian Language Arts to be updated to match the rest of the elementary curriculum in structure and philosophy.

Students experience a new curriculum in elementary school but will experience an “old” curriculum in junior high. There is no continuity of the progression of learning between elementary and junior high.

We need a fast-tracked revision of the junior high curriculum.

With the increased costs due to the Elections Act changes, our already significant election costs have increased.

We need targeted funding allocated specifically to cover the costs of school board elections.

Alberta has one of the lowest per student allocations in Canada. This results in a lower level of opportunity for our students.

We need per student funding to meet or exceed the Canadian per student funding average.

Changes to PUF funding have significantly limited our ability to meet the needs of our youngest learners.

We need the criteria for PUF funding to revert to include occupational therapy and behavioural needs, along with an overall funding increase.

There is significant workload to complete the assessments and support of PUF students by Speech Language Pathologists (SLP).

We need dedicated SLP funding or cross-ministry collaboration to increase SLP service to PUF students.

Rapid enrolment growth has created an unprecedented demand for teachers and classroom support staff. We also require teachers who are specialized in languages and Skilled Trades and Career education. We cannot keep up with the demand.

We need more post-secondary spaces, along with enhanced supports, incentives, and promotion of careers in the education sector. We need facilitated certification processes for internationally educated teachers.

Alberta Education and the City of Edmonton have different definitions of what “shovel ready” means for potential school sites. In the new School Construction Accelerator Program, preference is given to sites that Alberta Education considers ready; part of that is services to the site.

We need a standing mechanism for school divisions to meet with appropriate City of Edmonton departments, developers, and EPCOR to ensure that sites on our Capital Plan are expedited for services.

Excessive wait times in routine permitting processes are significantly impacting timelines for the construction and delivery of approved student spaces through both the Modular Classroom Program (MCP) and new school builds.

We need permits for education infrastructure to be fast-tracked. Schools are critical infrastructure, and we need the City of Edmonton to do everything possible to support them getting built as quickly as possible.

Many of our schools require ice time to deliver their programming. Access to ice time is becoming increasingly difficult, especially south of the river. This affects hockey programs and student physical education programs as well.

We need more ice infrastructure throughout the city, with a focus on the south side.

On Demand Transit service is ineffective for our students living in newer areas. There isn’t enough capacity on the small passenger buses to serve all students requiring ETS, thus forcing them to wait for another bus and creating delays in students getting home. Students are not allowed to use cell phones during class time, which also delays their ability to use On Demand Transit service.

We need School Special bus routes scheduled for new schools at the end of the school day.

Student safety is being compromised as students walk to school, particularly as they cross the street. Speeding and illegal parking are commonplace in school zones.

We need additional safety measures, such as more prominent signage around schools, including speed feedback signs and crosswalk lights to prompt motorists about safety. Enforcement measures such as additional, ongoing radar and photo radar in
school zones will increase motorist accountability.