A Calgary school has had to close its doors for a day while contact tracing is underway following word of a positive COVID-19 case, a closure that comes amid what advocates are calling a staffing “crisis.”
In a letter to parents on Sunday, the Calgary Board of Education said Coventry Hills School in the city’s northeast would be closed Monday as Alberta Health works to identify close contacts of the person who tested positive.
“This is solely due to staffing capacity issues,” the board said. “This will ensure that necessary operational planning and substitute teachers can be arranged and all health measures maintained.”
On Monday, a second case was confirmed at the school, meaning it officially had an outbreak. The board didn’t specify whether it was students or staff members who tested positive.
The school said it would be open for in-class instruction on Tuesday.
“As you are aware, every teacher has set up an online presence to support students while at home,” the board said, referencing a virtual presentation of the platform families and students were given in September.
Speaking to Global News on Monday, the advocacy group Support our Students said the staffing issue wasn’t unique to Coventry Hills School, adding that schools across the province are dealing with “a shortage of teachers.”
“This is, unfortunately, not a surprise to us as we’ve been monitoring really closely that staffing is a crisis,” communications director Wing Li said.
“If you get enough teachers that were close contacts of multiple cases, pretty soon you’re going to have no teachers at the school.
Li said the situation is “extreme,” adding the organization feels the government should have provided more funding to hire more teachers at the start of the pandemic.
She said teachers have been calling saying they feel overwhelmed, and even some online classes have as many as 50 students.
“We need the government to be honest about what’s happening,” she said.
“We need to see more teachers getting hired and more stable cohorting and smaller classes and just better measures.”
In an emailed statement, Alberta Education spokesperson Colin Aitchison said staffing is managed by individual authorities, not the province.
“The unfortunate reality is that there is only a finite number of certificated teachers in the province, and if a school does not have enough teachers due to isolation requirements, a temporary transition to online learning may be required,” he said.
Only three schools out of 2,415 in the province have had to transition to online learning since the start of the pandemic because of isolating staff issues, Aitchison said, adding that the impacted schools worked quickly to get substitutes into the classrooms.
“Alberta’s school authorities have been managing school re-entry well, and are finding solutions to access certificated substitute teachers in the province,” he said.
“As with everything related to learning during COVID-19, we continue to monitor the situation and will adapt our re-entry plan and guidelines as required.”
According to the Alberta Teachers’ Association, the problem is the government hasn’t provided the boards with adequate funding to have enough teachers and substitutes on their rosters.
“It all goes back to funding,” president Jason Schilling said. “And the provincial government are the ones who provide funding for school boards in order to have budgets for their schools and school districts in terms of subbing.”
As part of regular surveys of ATA members, Schilling said 92 per cent of teachers are reporting being exhausted by the end of the day as they struggle to keep up with their regular teaching responsibilities as well as the added health measures.
Schilling also said when teachers have to isolate and a substitute can’t be found, other teachers and principals are having to cover the classes internally, meaning they’re missing lunch hours, prep time and valuable time to work on things outside their normal teaching.
“I don’t know how this is sustainable for the entire school year,” Schilling said.
“Not doing anything is not acceptable. Government and school boards have the power in these situations, government has to release more funding to school boards so that they can address these issues that are happening in the classrooms and we also need to do some work with Alberta Health Services to improve communication.”
Schilling also said he’d like to see rapid testing made available to students and school staff so anyone exposed gets results and is able to return to the classroom as soon as possible.