MEDIA RELEASE: Alberta School Councils’ Association Provides Comment on ATA’s September 10 Strike Update

Edmonton, AB – September 10, 2025 – Alberta School Councils’ Association (ASCA) acknowledges the difficult announcement by the Alberta Teachers Association (ATA) that was made this morning. ASCA wants to give thanks to the ATA for providing advanced notice of intent to strike, for their good faith position on the matter, and for prioritizing their relationship with parents, care givers, and school communities.

Investing in Alberta’s future means we need to invest in our classrooms, and ASCA has had longstanding policies calling on the Government of Alberta to appropriately fund education. This includes accounting for classroom complexity, salaries, and specialized resources that positively support student learning conditions. It is important we see beyond this one year and look to how this will impact school communities 5 or 10 years down the road - this is not a single year situation. This is about the future of our classrooms and our children’s learning environments.

“There is value in the relationships forged between students, teachers, and parents – these are cornerstones of student’s success in education. But that success comes at a real-world cost,” said Ken Glazebrook, ASCA’s President. “We keep hearing announcements of new initiatives, but the increasing of funding is absent in those announcements.” Glazebrook pointed to the weighted average funding formula adjustment from 3 years to 2 years as a positive step, but a lack of appropriate funding for the thousands of new students entering the K-12 school system with current year over year enrollment growth across the province.

“We have maintained that this discussion is between the Government of Alberta and the Alberta Teachers Association, and have consistently tried to respect the bargaining process,” said Meagan Parisian, Vice President. “Given that the ATA voted with 94.5% to affirm a strike vote in the spring and it appears there has not been significant movement since that time, as this conversation moves forward it's imperative for all stakeholders to work together to find sustainable solutions that prioritize both fair compensation for staff and maintaining essential and critical resources for students' learning.”

School councils support the school community, both in the present and while looking ahead to the future. School councils have a legislated duty to communicate with their school community population, and ASCA has created a template that school councils can reference on how they can continue to communicate and will provide more resources to support school communities during labour disruptions (should they occur) in the coming days.

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