New Brunswick Teachers’ Association calls on government for better retention, recruitment efforts

The New Brunswick teachers union is raising concerns about staffing in classrooms.

The New Brunswick Teachers’ Association (NBTA) is calling on the provincial government, once again, to address and fix issues seen within the school system across the province.

Peter Legacy, president of NBTA, pointed out four main areas of concern Monday morning that he says require urgent action.

Those are:

• retention and recruitment
• classroom complexity
• teacher empowerment
• prioritizing certified professionals

“Nearly 1,000 teachers are expected to retire from Anglophone classrooms within three years. Twenty-five per cent of teachers are likely to retire within five years,” he said.

“How do we stop this from getting worse when we know that less than half our Bachelor of Education graduates are choosing to stay and teach in New Brunswick?”

Legacy adds, in the fall of 2024, 132 uncertified individuals were teaching within the Anglophone School Districts, a number that jumped to 192 by January.

Overall, the association says it’s calling on the government for a funding model that reflects the “socioeconomic and community specific needs” of each school including targeting human resource strategies, improved infrastructure, better compensation and bringing back mentorship programs.

Legacy says while it’s had conversations with the new Holt government, and while there are “some things in play,” it’s important to keep this conversation at the forefront.

“Some of this is going to take some money and some of it is going to take a different way of doing things as well, looking at improved funding models and those sorts of things,” he said.

“But it’s to keep the conversation going. We can’t let it die and let it stop because the future of the province certainly depends on having certified teachers in front of every student and that’s got to remain the focus.”

Legacy says the NBTA is ready to work with the government to implement real solutions.

“While I feel like stating these facts may sound like a broken record, I’ve heard it takes seven times for a message to be truly understood, so this time understand me when I say that teachers are not thriving, most are merely surviving,” he said.

Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Claire Johnson said in a statement to CTV News that it’s continuing to work with stakeholders to address issues including retention and recruitment.

“Teacher retention and recruitment is one of the top priority areas for our government, and we recognize that one of the best ways to recruit new teachers to the profession is to fix the problems faced by our current teachers,” she said in part.

“These issues did not appear overnight, and they will not be fixed overnight.”

Johnson says a teacher retention and recruitment strategy will be released in the coming weeks.

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