STF waiting for dollar figure after province promises more education funding

The Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation says the provincial government’s promise to provide school divisions with more funding needs to come with a dollar figure attached.

“This is the regular process that the government has. When there are additional students, they do a reconciliation in the fall,” said Samantha Becotte, president of the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation.

“Until I see an announcement about additional funds for this current school year, they really aren’t adjusting to anything that we’ve seen in the past.”

While the government said it’s committing more money to help school divisions deal with rising enrolment, inflation and other pressures, the announcement didn’t provide divisions with a specific number on how much more money the province will be dishing out.

“The premier has said he hears the message, but until I see some real action from this government, they still haven’t made children a priority,” Becotte stated.

“It means they really haven’t made any commitments. Until they’ve made an announcement with a number that really shows they’ve changed their funding for education and made a real investment in kids, we’re still going to push our message that our kids are important and we need to see a significant investment in their education.”

She said the current level of funding for school divisions is forcing them to make tough decisions, and some cuts are already happening.

“We know it’s going to create further cuts to programs and services, and we’re hearing more school divisions coming out and saying they’re going to be losing more teaching positions,” Becotte explained.

“As recently as Monday I heard from one of the Regina school divisions that they’re going to be losing as many as 35 teaching positions. With class sizes bursting as they are, it’s just larger classes and makes it difficult for teachers to meet the needs for all of their students.”

Becotte said she hopes the additional funding will meet the rate of inflation.

She encouraged anyone frustrated about education funding to reach out to their MLA and call on the government to take action.