Alberta Education Minister Adriana LaGrange has ordered an independent financial audit and governance review of the Calgary Board of Education in the wake of the public school board’s decision to cut 300 temporary teachers.
On Tuesday, the CBE said it had cut 300 temporary teacher contracts after its provincial funding was reduced by $32 million.
The board has said the province is funding enrolment growth at $29 million — leaving base funding per student unchanged — but also eliminating three grants totalling $85 million and only partially replacing these cuts with a one-time transition grant of $24 million.
But in a release on Wednesday, LaGrange said the cuts exemplify the CBE’s “inability to appropriately manage its finances and prioritize student learning in its operations.”
“I have been extremely clear that I expect all boards to minimize impacts on front-line staff and teachers, and to prioritize the educational experience of our students,” she said.
LaGrange said the CBE has a history of questionable and irresponsible financial decision-making, citing the board’s decision in 2010 to enter into a costly 20-year lease of office space in a new building in the Beltline.
She also said a 2018 provincial audit of the board found that it had made a $9.1-million accounting error, allocating office space costs as instructional costs.
“The reckless misuse of taxpayer dollars by this board cannot be allowed to continue,” she said.
“This audit and governance review will give government a path forward on helping the Calgary Board of Education prioritize the classroom and find efficiencies elsewhere in its operations. There is no reason that a board with an operating budget of $1.2-billion servicing 130,000 students should be reducing teaching positions and harming our children’s education experience.”
An audit of the CBE’s finances in 2018 — which included a focus on concerns over student busing — offered no recommendations on how the school board could improve its service.