Funding to address pandemic learning gaps in Alberta's Grade 1 students delayed

Calgary school boards say they're still waiting for funding from Alberta Education to address pandemic learning losses in numeracy and literacy for Grade 1 students.

Literacy and numeracy assessments of Alberta's Grade 1 students took place early January. But school boards say they still don't know how much money they'll be allotted toward interventions.

"I was told that we would have received it two weeks ago and we have we still don't know what our numbers are," said CBE superintendent of school improvement, Joanne Pitman. 

Last May, the premier announced $45 million would be made available to school authorities to address learning disruptions caused by the pandemic.

Time running out for Grade 1 interventions

Assessments for Grade 2 and 3 students took place in the fall, and money was doled out to school boards at a rate of $490 per impacted student. It allowed boards to hire more staff to run the 16 week intervention programs.

But time is running out for kids in Grade 1.

"We're lucky, we might get a 12 week intervention with our Grade 1 students if there is funding becoming available in the next week or two," said Helmut Kaiser, director of learning services for the Calgary Catholic School District.

Pitman fears it'll actually end up being only eight weeks of interventions. 

"We're at spring break up coming here and this was supposed to be a 12 to 16 week program. So by the time you have stuff in place and this is across the province, just think about the timing of that," she said.

"We have essentially eight weeks, really, because June, we're having to report so we've since we don't know what our allocation is, we can't actually get staff in place."

Deadline pushed

Alberta Education says the deadline to apply for Grade 1 funding was extended to February 7.

"Final approval of the program is currently underway. We anticipate that funds will be provided to school authorities in the coming weeks," read a statement from education ministry press secretary Katherine Stavropoulos.

Kaiser said Grade 1 teachers aren't waiting for funds to be disbursed to help students identified during assessments.

"What we've done is we've shared the data from the reading assessments so schools are aware of which students have been identified as at risk in literacy and numeracy," he said.

"Most teachers would have already known that these kids were struggling, so they would have been supporting those students already."

But he says additional targeted dollars and staff would bolster these efforts. 

Improvements noted

When it comes to the ongoing intervention program for Grade 2 and 3 students, Kaiser says teachers are noting improvements. 

"We're about two months into those, so about halfway through and the feedback from the intervention teachers has been quite positive," he said. "The intervention lessons and activities are having a positive effect on the literacy, the foundational literacy and numeracy skills of our Grade 2 and 3 students."

The province is asking school boards to administer assessments to students in Grades 1 through 3 again in May.