As B.C. students head back to class across the province, the union representing their teachers is sounding the alarm on what it says is a critical staffing shortage.
The B.C. Teachers’ Federation says B.C.’s soaring cost of living coupled with salaries that are the second lowest in Canada is making it hard to recruit new teachers, and to hold onto teachers already on the rolls.
Some of those teachers are pulling up stakes and moving to provinces eastward, like Alberta, where wages are higher and the cost of living lower, according to BCTF president Clint Johnston.
With teachers locked in negotiations with the province on their latest collective agreement, Johnston said the sticking point remains wages.
“The crux of it right now really is … salaries that will keep up to the rising inflation we see right now,” he said. “That kind of inflation can be a really affected pay cut.”
Staffing shortages have become severe enough that some districts in B.C.’s interior and north have begun advertising work for uncertified substitute teachers.
“We know there are uncertified individuals teaching around the province, but to see it advertised, asked for, to kind of accept it, that’s a really concern for us,” Jonston said.
The shortage has some among the opposition calling on the province to hike wages to stem the bleeding.
“We’re in competition for good teachers in this province,” Saanich North and the Islands Green MLA Adam Olsen said.
“We want to have the best education system in the country. We’re going to have to make sure we’re investing in it that way.”
Education minister Jennifer Whiteside wouldn’t comment directly on negotiations Tuesday, saying only that wages were a subject of discussion between teachers and their employer.
Teachers are due back at the bargaining table on Sept. 26, though Johnston said they’re hoping to resume bargaining earlier than that.
For the time being, however, he said the union is not contemplating job action.