Saskatchewan Education Minister Dustin Duncan says rising fuel and insurance costs are cause for a one-time $20-million top up to the provincial education budget.
“Now that all the (school division) budgets have been submitted we certainly have a better understanding of the inflationary pressures around transportation,” Duncan said in Regina Thursday, “as well as other inflationary pressures like insurance premiums that have been going up across the divisions.”
Duncan told reporters that, as he engaged with Saskatchewan’s 27 school divisions while they drafted their budgets for the coming school year, he heard concerns around divisions’ plans to increase class sizes and in some cases combine multiple grades into one classroom.
He said decisions were being made to reduce teacher and staffing levels as divisions redirected money towards fuel and insurance. He said approximately 75 per cent of the $20 million will satisfy increased fuel cost needs with the other $5 million a response to increased insurance premiums.
“We’re asking school divisions, based on the funding each of them will receive, to submit an amended budget, which we will then review,” he said, adding divisions will have until mid-September to submit revised budgets.
“This does give time in the event that school divisions are going to be using the funding to hire to go through that process and hopefully have those additional positions in place, maybe not for the beginning of the school year but early in the school year.”
Duncan added that the announcement comes with the province “in a different position budget-wise than we were in the spring.”
“Those numbers aren’t finalized. The first quarter’s not even complete yet, but it looks to be we’re going to be in a different position than we were then,” he said.
“Certainly know that this is not going to address all the concerns they have talked about but school divisions have to make decisions with the dollars they do have.”
As for future plans, Duncan promised his government will “keep an open dialogue with organizations like Saskatchewan School Boards Association (SSBA).”
“We’re going to continue to provide resources where we can,” he said.
“I think there’s a lot of focus on the operational side. The balance of that, though, is we have a significant build across the province when it comes to school divisions building and renovating schools. That has to come from somewhere as well.”
The province’s latest budget included $168.6 million for ongoing capital projects including the construction of 15 new schools and renovations at five more. $1.99 billion in operating funding was announced in the budget, a 1.5 per cent increase from the previous year.
Saskatchewan School Boards Association President Shawn Davidson, though, says that while the funding is welcome it won’t relieve all of the pressures school divisions are facing.
“This is something we’ve been talking about for quite some time now, about how the provincial budget which was released back in March fell short of the cost drivers and inflatioonary pressures school divisions were facing.”
He said that while the money will relieve fuel and insurance costs, potential rate increases at SaskPower and SaskEnergy, contractual increases to school support staff salaries and potential enrolment growth still isn’t covered.
He said decisions have been made at some divisions to scale back staffing and classroom supports, as well as to implement lunchtime supervision fees.
“This is $20 million. We saw individual divisions make cuts in multi-million dollar figures,” Davidson said.
“So once this is distributed through all of our memberships, it’s not going to allow for the reversal of all of those decisions.”
Davidson also agreed the funding comes at a less than ideal time for divisions to hire or rehire as the school year approaches.
Still, he called the new money “encouraging” and said he hopes it can be a first step towards school divisions and the provincial government seeing eye-to-eye on education funding levels.
“I think we’re hopeful, with this, that the government will take some time to sit down with us before the budget is released next March,” he said, “and really get to know our needs, get to know what an investment in education actually looks like, and then pass a budget in March that ultimately allows for divisions to provide additional supports and enhance services.”
But Duncan added that while the province may be in a better financial position than projected, the province has priorities beyond education including paying down its roughly $460 million deficit.
“School divisions do have to make decisions with the finite dollars that they do have,” he said.
“School divisions have the ability to offer things like full day every day kindergarten, or more of a universal pre-K, but then to say ‘now government you must fund this’, that’s not how this works.”
The Saskatchewan NDP also responded to the announcement Thursday, pointing out that when added up, budgeting shortfalls claimed by Saskatoon Public Schools, Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools, Regina Public Schools, Chinook School Division, Regina Catholic Schools and South East Cornerstone alone totaled nearly $20 million.
“School divisions are facing sky high inflationary pressures and the funding announced today is a drop in the bucket that only covers the shortfalls of six out of twenty seven school divisions,” said NDP Leader Carla Beck.
The Saskatchewan NDP called on the province to “stop sitting on unbudgeted resource revenues and commit to a funding package of a full $50 million and to commit adequate, predictable funding that covers inflationary costs moving forward.”