#306 Inside Alberta’s $355M Classroom Plan with Minister Demetrios Nicolaides

Sapreet talks with the Minister of Education and Childcare for Alberta, Demetrios Nicolaides about the province’s new education spending and what it’s meant to change inside real classrooms. We dig into student growth, classroom complexity, rural access to specialists, and how parents and educators can track whether the new supports actually work:

• Budget 2026 investments tied to class size and classroom complexity 
• Enrolment growth of roughly 90,000 students in four years and what that pressure looks like in schools 
• How complexity teams are staffed and how they support teachers day to day 
• Examples of one-on-one intervention for behaviour and learning needs 
• Saskatchewan as a reference point and plans for surveys and data collection 
• Extra barriers for rural and remote schools and funding to cover travel and accommodation for specialists 
• Different support models for K to 6 versus grades 7 to 12 and why flexibility matters 
• How parents can find out if their school gets a team and where to share feedback 

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Transcript

Alberta Announces New Education Hiring

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Alberta's government is investing $100 million to hire more teachers, educational assistants, and specialized support staff to support complex classrooms. To talk about this further, joining me is the Minister of Education and Childcare. Welcome, Minister. Great to speak to you again. How are you today?

SPEAKER_01 0:17

I'm great. Thanks so much. I'm really happy to be here.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Absolutely. I'm looking forward to our conversation. I know there's a lot of questions about what this budget means. A lot of parents are wondering. So let's get right into

Budget 2026 And Student Growth

SPEAKER_00 0:28

it. So I want to begin by talking about Budget 2026, which includes $355 million invested to address both class sizes and classroom complexity. What challenges in Alberta classrooms made this level of investment necessary?

SPEAKER_01 0:43

Well, we've seen significant growth in our classrooms over the last four years. In just four short years, our schools have added about 90,000 students into the classrooms. This is a level of increase that we've never seen before in the province. So we're working aggressively to build new schools. We've made an $8.6 billion commitment to build over 100 new schools across the province. And as you mentioned, in budget 26, we put $355 million aside to help us hire more teachers, educational assistants, and other specialists to address the complexity in the classroom. A lot of that complexity comes from students with unique learning needs, students who maybe have behavioral challenges, emotional challenges, academic needs, or even help learning English. So as we welcome more of these students, the demand for more help and supports in the classroom is there. And we are stepping up to make sure that our kids have the level of support that they need.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

Now, as you just mentioned, and teachers have also said that they're managing classrooms with more diverse learning, with more behavioral needs. How will these complexity teams make a tangible difference in the day-to-day classroom experience for both the students and the teachers with this funding?

How Complexity Teams Work

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Yeah, these teams will go a long way to help address challenges that teachers are seeing in the classroom. So the complexity teams exist with one teacher and two educational assistants, and they are assigned to specific schools where we know they have more issues. And so these teams will be able to go into a classroom if a teacher requires some extra help and provide some targeted one-on-one help with a student in a classroom. So, for example, if there's a student in a classroom who's not really having the best day and is having some behavioral problems and is not able to focus, is not able to sit still and maybe causing disruption to other students, this complexity team would be able to come in and help that student, uh, give them some uh special attention and help ensure that the teacher can remain focused on uh educating the rest of the classroom as well. Or even if the student maybe needs some more one-on-one attention outside of the classroom and maybe some uh more individualized support, the team would be able to help deliver that.

Learning From Saskatchewan And Measuring Results

SPEAKER_00 3:25

And minister, are there any other provinces or any other regions that have a similar model set up that has a complexity classrooms uh set up already that we could sort of look off of to see what worked and what didn't work for them?

SPEAKER_01 3:39

Yeah, absolutely. Uh we took some inspiration actually from uh Saskatchewan next door. Uh they have uh a pilot program that uh they are launching, which is very similar uh to the one that we have developed here in Alberta. Uh their program is a little bit smaller though, and in Alberta, we have uh dispatched over 600 complexity teams across the province. But you're right, it's important that we measure the effectiveness of these teams. So one of the things that we will be doing is some survey and data collection from teachers, from principals, and from our school boards to understand if these teams are doing what uh we expect them to do and what kind of an impact they're having on the classroom. So we will be doing this kind of analysis at the end to make sure that the teams are having uh a real measurable impact.

Rural And Remote Access To Specialists

SPEAKER_00 4:42

Excellent. Now let's talk about rural and remote schools. I know budget 2026 includes funding for both rural and remote schools, but how will the province ensure that students outside of the major urban centers, outside of Edmonton, Calgary will have equitable access to these new supports?

SPEAKER_01 4:58

Yeah, absolutely. Getting some of this support and specialists like psychologists or occupational therapists or speech language pathologists out to our uh rural communities can be a little bit more of a challenge because the school division might have to fly them in, uh, might have to pay for hotel and accommodation costs for several days. So, one of the things that we're doing out of the hundred million that uh we announced at the end of June, uh some of that funding will go specifically to rural and remote schools to help them cover the cost of bringing some of these specialists into their communities because we recognize there can be those extra costs and it can be a little bit more difficult. So this funding will help cover some of those extra costs.

Different Models For Older Students

SPEAKER_00 5:47

And one other thing I noticed in the announcement that just came out last week is there's different support models for the K to 6, so kindergarten to 6 and grade sevens to 12 for the complexity teams. Can you explain the difference, but also why the government chose to have different support models for younger and olden students?

SPEAKER_01 6:07

Yeah, absolutely. For our elementary system, the complexity teams will have one teacher and two educational assistants. For our junior high and high school settings, the complexity teams, as you've mentioned, will look a little bit different. They will be comprised of one teacher, one EA, and two other specialists that the school division determines is needed. And this is because the needs, of course, in junior high and high school can be substantially different and more complex, of course, as students are getting older and experiencing more challenges. And so what kind of support a school might need can really differ and vary. And this will give the school divisions a flexibility to look at exactly what kind of support students in their schools in a particular community or section of the city need and go and get those supports.

SPEAKER_00 7:07

Okay, great

Parent Feedback Options And Closing

SPEAKER_00 7:08

to know. And lastly, I know you mentioned there will be surveys, there'll be analytics available for parents. How will they be able to sort of measure or be able to know what the effectiveness of this model is? Or will there be any way that they'll be able to put their input and give their feedback on what their children and students are feeling?

SPEAKER_01 7:28

Yeah, absolutely. Of course, the first point of contact is uh their teacher and their principal at their local school. Uh, and so I would encourage them to have a conversation with the teacher or principal at the school. Uh, if they want to know more information about these complexity teams, they can visit the Government of Alberta website and we have a detailed list that provides information about which schools and which school divisions are receiving these teams. So the parents can check there to see if their school is receiving a complexity team, and then have some more conversations with their teacher or principal about how that team is being used at their school and if their child needs some additional extra support. Of course, they can as well uh provide feedback to me and my office directly if they want to see the complexity teams doing something different or they don't think that they're being as effective as they should be. Uh, if they feel as though expressing those concerns at the school level uh is not helping, they can always reach out to me. But the first stop should be at their local school.

SPEAKER_00 8:35

Amazing. And everyone who's tuned in, all those links and resources are available on our social media where you can find more information. And with that, Minister, is there anything else you would like to leave with all of our listeners that are tuned in right now?

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Yeah, the only thing I would say is that we're making historic investments into our education system, and this is going to make dramatic changes for the better in our education system because we want to make sure that every kid has the right tools that they need to succeed. And I'm really excited to be able to deliver on that promise.

SPEAKER_00 9:09

Thank you, Minister. I appreciate your time, and I look forward to having you back on air soon.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

Of course, my pleasure. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

Thank you. Bye bye.