In response to last night’s election results, Alberta Teachers’ Association president Jason Schilling is calling for collaboration to best support Alberta’s students and public education.
“A new mandate for government and a newly constituted legislature provide an opportunity to build the relationship between teachers and government and to work together on the issues affecting public education.
With this election behind us, we now need to get going on the hard work needed to better support students and ensure that our public education system, which serves 93 per cent of the province’s students, continues to be one of the best in the world:
-
As highlighted in the election campaign, we must address the systemic issues of class size, complexity and support for students with special learning needs.
-
Per-student funding, in Canada’s wealthiest province, cannot continue to be the lowest in the country.
-
Teacher recruitment and retention issues will reach a crisis if not addressed very quickly.
-
Teachers continue to have fundamental concerns about the new curriculum, which must be addressed. I know that Premier Smith shares many of these concerns.
I look forward to working with government on these important matters and to helping strengthen the relationship between teachers and government. Premier Smith and I have spoken about this on several occasions prior to her becoming leader of the UCP, and I trust that she will continue, as premier, to make relationship building a priority for the next education minister.
Relationship building includes engaging in conversations at the local level, and I know that teachers will be reaching out soon to new and returning MLAs to begin sharing their stories and ideas for working together for public education.”
—Jason Schilling, ATA president
The Alberta Teachers’ Association, as the professional organization of teachers, promotes and advances public education, supports teachers’ professional practice and serves as the advocate for its 46,000 members.