Grading promises at the heart of the dispute between teachers, province
As the provincial government and teachers attempt to avert a strike or other job action, lots of numbers are being thrown around.
Here is a closer look of some of those numbers and what they mean:
Government's claims of support
The Liberals campaigned in the last election on putting $65 million into education for items such as elementary school classroom caps, math and literacy support and a curriculum review. Premier Stephen McNeil and Education Minister Karen Casey have also repeatedly touted hiring 500 new teachers.
Did they do that? Mostly.
The Grits created 532 new full-time equivalent positions to meet classroom caps and augment math and literacy support.
During that same period, 561.8 full-time equivalent positions were lost to retirement. Funding for staffing is based on enrolment and so only 341.2 full-time equivalent positions were filled to replace those retiring teachers.
Taking all of those numbers into account leaves a net gain of 311.4 full-time equivalent teaching positions since the Liberals formed government.
Funding breakdown
The Liberals' commitment of $65 million was intended to be spread over four years. What's been spent so far:
- 2014-15: $17.5 million, which includes money for the early-years program, class caps, special education and student support grants.
- 2015-16: $20.4 million, which includes money for class caps, the math strategy, early literacy and the minister's action plan for education.
- 2016-17: $20.9 million focused on the action plan, class sizes, mental health, math and literacy support.
That makes a total of $58.8 million, leaving $6.2 million to come to make good on the government's promise.
Overcrowded classrooms
Teachers have expressed repeated concerns about class sizes, particularly at the junior and senior high school levels where there are no class caps. The Liberals promised to phase in caps for Grades primary to 6.
How did they do?
- Grades primary to 2: Capped at 20 students, with flexibility.
- Grades 3 to 6: Capped at 25, with flexibility.
(Flexibility is generally understood to mean an extra two students.)
Right now 98 elementary school classes out of 2,839 exceed the hard caps. Of those, 65 classes exceed the hard cap by one student, 21 exceed it by two, seven are over by three students, four are over by four students and one class tops the hard cap by five students.
Teachers' wages and benefits
The union wants the long-service award retained and salary increases that meet cost of living increases.
The long-service award is available to teachers with at least 10 years of service and is paid out upon retirement or death, based on the number of years served and salary at the end of service.
The government has said it would freeze the award as of 2015 and no longer make it available to anyone else. The premier on Thursday said to keep the long-service award, teachers would have to give up another benefit of equal value ($7.4 million annually).
The government's wage offer to teachers is the same as for other public sector workers: two years of no increases followed by a three per cent increase spread across two years.
Currently, the highest teacher salary is $92,286. The starting salary for most teachers is $51,711.
The average salary, based on a mix of licences and step increases, is $76,133.
Correction : A previous version of this article said 220.6 full-time equivalent teaching positions were lost due to declining enrolment. In fact, the province has provided clarification and says the 561.8 positions lost to retirement include the 220.6 positions not filled on account of declining enrolment. The article also previously stated there was a net gain of 90.8 full-time equivalent teaching positions since the Liberals formed government. In fact, based on this clarification, there was a net gain of 311.4 positions.(Oct 27, 2016 8:44 PM)
