A Saskatchewan high school student organized a protest outside the Legislature on Thursday in response to the province's education budget.
"If you do not fund our schools and we are not properly educated, that could severely affect our economy and our province," said Nathaniel Schaefer, a Grade 11 student in Fillmore, 107 km southeast of Regina.
He said his school has two teachers teaching Grade 7 through Grade 12.
“They have to teach 20 curriculums in one year. Our math teacher teaches three advanced math (classes) at once, it is extremely stressful on our teachers, on everyone,” Schaefer said.
The protest comes a day after Saskatoon Public Schools and Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools (GSCS) issued letters to warn parents and caregivers that operational cuts would come in the 2022-23 school year
The 2022-23 provincial budget included a $24.9 million increase in operational funding for school divisions. The Saskatchewan government plans to spend a total of $1.99 billion on school operating costs.
"Most of that ($23.4 million) is earmarked for provincially negotiated salary increases in the sector," says a letter signed by board chair Diane Boyko and Greg Chatlain, director of education at Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools.
"It leaves $6 million as the increase for all other expenses. For Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools, that will be an estimated $660,000 more," the letter says.
“We are going to be looking at things like our transportation, things like utilities as well as insurance. That’s an $800,000 increase from the year previously. We’re going to be looking at staying away as much as possible from the classroom,” Boyko told CTV News.
The Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation (STF) says it’s a “sad day” for students in Saskatoon and across the province as school divisions look to deal with an “insufficient” education budget from the province.
STF President Patrick Maze says the potential cuts are a combination of “several years of underfunding” of education that is a big concern.
“Every year school divisions are looking for a little bit extra beyond inflation and beyond enrollment and sadly this is another year of not meeting inflation and not meeting enrollment so more cuts are coming,” Maze told CTV News.
Maze says Chinook School Division has already forecasted it will cut some staff members.
According to the school division’s website, Chinook is starting from a $4.2 million deficit and the projected inflationary costs for the upcoming school year will add another $1.5 million and will force the division to use reserves again.
On Thursday, Education Minister Dustin Duncan said he will have discussions with the boards over the coming weeks as they will have until June to present their budgets for the ministry’s approval.
Duncan says he’s taking the division's concerns “very seriously.”
“I haven’t made a commitment to school divisions that there will be more money because it’s typically not the process that we follow,” Duncan said.
With files from Donovan Maess
