Concerns raised about teacher shortage in N.B. just days before start of school year

Less than a week before the beginning of the school year, New Brunswick’s four anglophone school districts say they are still hiring teachers.

That’s ringing alarm bells for the New Brunswick Teachers’ Association. NBTA president Peter Lagacy says teachers are worried that shortages seen last year will greet them as this school year gets underway.

“Although teachers are eager to welcome students back, they remain concerned that the critical staffing shortages continue into this year as districts are still advertising full-time teaching positions just two working days before school starts,” he said.

“Last year, 1,000 New Brunswickers stepped up in their communities to help their local schools stay open, but they weren’t professional teachers.”

While they are still hiring, all four anglophone school districts say they are expecting to have all positions filled by the time students arrive for school on Tuesday. Only the Anglophone South School District provided a number of vacant teacher positions, which currently stands at 10.

In a statement, Anglophone West superintendent David McTimoney said the district is expecting to have a full complement of teachers by next week.

“Currently, we are very busy with staffing and student registration. Some vacancies remain; however, our staffing team is working hard to have all classroom teachers in place by next Tuesday,” he said.

“The number of vacancies is shifting and will continue to do so throughout the week. Likewise, class sizes and configurations will also vary as new students register and others move out of the district.”

But according to the NBTA, just ensuring that all full-time positions are filled isn’t enough. Lagacy says a lack of supply teachers has left schools stretched thin in recent years, with the number of unfilled absences of teachers rising.

In the first two months of the last school year in the Anglophone School District South, 510 classes were unable to find one of the 450 available supply teachers, leading to classes being shifted or vacancies being filled by school administration themselves or support workers.

Earlier this month the province announced it would be contracting supply teachers to stay on permanently with schools in order to step in should teachers fall ill but the NBTA says a more comprehensive recruitment and retention strategy is needed.

“Our province’s school-aged population continues to grow and that will create an even greater need for more teachers,” Lagacy said.

“All this reinforces the need for the government to recognize the value of the teaching profession with an immediate strategy to retain and recruit teachers to the province.”

Education Minister Bill Hogan was not made available for an interview.