Provincial funding mixed picture for LRSD

Livingstone Range School Division is receiving new provincial money for smaller classes and additional classroom supports, but its own budget shows the funding will not translate into an overall increase in teachers this school year.

Education and Childcare Minister Demetrios Nicolaides outlined the province’s education spending during a rural media round table Sept. 10, describing the 2026-27 school year as a return to “more teachers, more in-classroom supports and more school spaces.”

The province has committed $218 million to establish 699 classroom complexity teams and another $200 million to help school authorities hire more than 1,400 kindergarten to Grade 9 teachers.

Nicolaides said 566 complexity teams had been staffed by the beginning of September, including 211 outside Calgary and Edmonton.

Livingstone Range’s June budget identified approximately $433,000 in complexity-team funding and $405,000 through the Class Size Reduction Grant.

The class-size grant allowed the division to add three teaching positions, while complexity funding added three educational assistants and helped preserve other positions that otherwise could have been lost.

However, Livingstone Range is still budgeting for 205.5 certificated full-time equivalent positions this year, down from 210.5 in 2025-26.

Division budget documents attribute the net reduction to declining enrolment and changes to rural-school funding. Livingstone Range has lost approximately 115 full-time equivalent students over two years, while two of its four schools qualifying for the Rural Small Schools Grant were projected to fall into lower funding categories.

That change could reduce the division’s funding by $213,821, although the money could be restored if September enrolment is higher than projected.

“Funding levels have a direct impact on staffing levels,” the division said in its budget report.

The contrast places Livingstone Range in a different position than rapidly growing urban school authorities. While the province has added close to 90,000 students over four years, the rural division is managing declining enrolment and the funding reductions that follow it.

Nicolaides said funding is distributed largely according to enrolment, meaning the amount received varies considerably between school authorities.

“All will be getting a slice of the pie to help support students with diverse learning needs, because we know that there are students in every corner of the province that need additional help,” he said.

The first two kindergarten to Grade 6 complexity teams assigned to Livingstone Range were placed at A.B. Daley Community School in Nanton and W.A. Day Elementary School in Fort Macleod.

The division was subsequently allocated one additional Grade 7 to 12 team. That team is assigned at the school-authority level and can be deployed where the division determines the need is greatest. No Crowsnest Pass school has been publicly identified as its location.

Rural recruitment was raised during the round table by Somya Lohia of Shootin’ the Breeze, who asked how the province would ensure the positions it announced could be filled in communities where teacher recruitment, retention and housing can present challenges.

Nicolaides said individual school boards remain responsible for hiring.

“I do recognize, though, that it can be a little bit more challenging to recruit staff in some of our smaller communities,” he said.

The province has set aside $25 million for training and improved access to specialized services in rural and remote communities. Nicolaides said the money could help divisions cover travel and accommodation when occupational therapists, speech-language pathologists and other specialists must be brought into a community.

He did not provide a Livingstone Range-specific allocation during the round table.

Nicolaides also acknowledged that shortages of professionals qualified to conduct psychoeducational and cognitive assessments could continue to create delays for rural families.

“There is a very limited number of individuals that do conduct comprehensive psychoeducational assessments or other types of cognitive studies,” he said.

“Since that staff is limited, it will unfortunately mean that there might continue to be delays in getting assessments.”

School infrastructure was another focus of the discussion.

Nicolaides said Alberta school divisions submitted more than 440 capital-project requests last year, while the province can approve approximately 30 new projects annually.

“Less than 10 per cent of requested projects are able to be approved to start development,” he said.

The $8.6-billion Schools Now program is intended to finance new schools while modernizing or replacing eight to 10 aging schools each year. Nicolaides said the province must balance overcrowding in rapidly growing communities with rising maintenance costs at older rural schools.

Livingstone Range’s 2026-29 capital plan lists a replacement for Livingstone School in Lundbreck as its first priority and a review of future school needs in Pincher Creek as its second.

Crowsnest Pass and Stavely are listed under the division’s longer-term facilities plan, with Livingstone Range seeking planning money to review building conditions and determine future capital requirements. No specific Crowsnest Pass replacement or modernization project is currently identified in the three-year capital priorities.

Livingstone Range trustees have made equitable funding for rural public education one of their advocacy priorities for 2025-27, along with improved mental-health supports and equitable access to programming.