This will be the first provincial budget since the recent arbitration ruling in favour of class complexity in a new collective bargaining agreement between the province and its teachers.
Published Mar 19, 2025 • Last updated 3 hours ago • 2 minute read
Grade 1 and 2 students at Holy Rosary Community School complete classwork on Wednesday, June 5, 2024 in Regina. Photo by KAYLE NEIS /Regina Leader-Post The Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation (STF) will be looking for funding to support class complexity in the 2025-26 provincial budget.
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Wednesday’s budget will be the first since a the STF’s lengthy labour dispute with the provincial government ended earlier this month, with an arbitration board ruling that class complexity will be included in a new collective bargaining agreement. The new agreement, which calls for a class-complexity fund of $20 million per year (in addition to other provincial funding) and a wage increase for teachers, still needs to be finalized.
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“We’ve had a decade of underfunding in Saskatchewan. And we know it’s not going to fix the effects within one year,” STF president Samantha Becotte told the Leader-Post Tuesday, referencing last year’s budget allocation.
In the 2024-25 budget, the province directed $356.6 million to supports for classrooms, including to address classroom size and complexity. This was out of the total $3.3 billion in funding allocated to the Ministry of Education for last year under the budget titled “Classrooms, Care and Communities.”
“Last year’s budget was a positive step forward to start addressing some of those challenges. When we look at this year’s budget, we want to continue to repair the damage,” Becotte said. “Even in our current year, as I said with that $356 million, that’s through the supports for learning (budget) line, that didn’t meet the needs of our students,”
It is not yet known how the much will be allocated to education in the upcoming budget. Last year’s budget received a bump in funding of $247.8 million from the previous year (2023-24), with $45.6 million of that increase going towards classroom complexity.
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The STF estimates that in order to keep up with inflationary pressures and enrolment growth, an increase in the education line of only four-to-five per cent would still be status quo.
Last year, the 27 school divisions in the province received $2.2 billion for 2024-25 operating costs — $180 million more than the year before.
In the November throne speech, Premier Scott Moe also promised to expand a pilot program for 200 additional schools to receive specialized support to deal with students with higher needs.
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— with files from The Canadian Press
nyking@postmedia.com
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