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A Playbook to Dismantle Public Education in Alberta.

A Playbook to Dismantle Public Education in Alberta.
Public Education Tool Est. 2023

Alberta’s slow (education system) famine.

Now Premier, then talk show host Danielle Smith, publicly stated on 770 CHQR, posted March 7, 2018 11:01 AM:[1]

“Maybe every independent school needs to be fully funded and we need to phase out every government-run, union-controlled public school more interested in indoctrinating students than teaching them critical-thinking skills. We are spending billions of dollars to graduate students that have no capacity to think. When are public schools going to be held accountable for that?”

This was a statement by Smith in 2018, years before she became Premier. Now she has to be more careful with her words, however intent and actions are very clear.

Defund public education.
Phase out public schools.

You can read her entire post here: Danielle Smith: Maybe we need to defund public schools[1]

How do you (slowly) unravel and dismantle the current public school system in Alberta? Our Bloody Business: Alberta Education series explains components of the playbook to achieve this.

Tell us how many of these tactics sound familiar in Alberta today.

Starve the core. Per-student funding lags enrolment and inflation, then efficiency rhetoric is used to justify shifting students elsewhere.

What starvation looks like? Alberta slid to 10th (that’s last in Canada) in per-student spending in 2022/23; the Fraser Institute’s 2025 edition shows Alberta moved from 5th to 10th over the decade. Fraser Institute[11][12][13]

A core education system that is starved of funding and on the brink, makes other choices part of a government’s reform more appealing to the masses.

We call it Alberta’s slow (education system) famine.

To understand how a government creates a public education system famine, we dissect the key factors. Real crises are rarely due to one factor. Manufactured crises, as in this case, uses a mix of ingredients that show up in different amounts. Pulling the pieces apart allows us to uncover what may be happening in Alberta.

Starving the core.

That gnawing, prolonged lack of appropriate funding; the social reality of being unable to get levels of funding from government and the “clinical” factors of a system malnourished.

After accounting for Alberta’s official inflation, per-student K-12 funding in 2024-25 is roughly flat-to-down, about $150 lower per student in real terms than 2023-24. [5][6][7][9]

Using the base education budget, it’s roughly $150 less per student in real terms; using the in-year top-ups, it’s about $50 more per student. Either way, not a meaningful bump.[5][6][7][9]

Enrolment jumped and prices rose due to inflation. The budget went up but so did the number of kids and the cost of everything from paper to payroll.[7][9]

The government's grant allocation tweak helps timing, not student funding. Moving from a 3-year to a 2-year enrolment average means dollars follow growth a bit faster but it doesn’t increase the amount per student.[14][15]

What grant allocation change? Alberta used a 3-year weighted moving average (WMA) enrolment for grant allocations through 2024-25, and switches to a 2-year “adjusted enrolment” methodology starting in 2025-26.[14][15][6][7][9]

Why does this matter? At an estimated 4% to 6% enrolment growth (common in Alberta’s bigger urban centers) the new method can move 2% to 3% of students from effectively unfunded to funded status. Real money for teachers but not a silver bullet.[16]

Significant enough to matter in classrooms, especially where enrolment is surging but it’s a timing fix, not a funding fix. It turns down the heat a bit but it does not rebuild the operating base.

What it means in classrooms? Don’t expect smaller classes or a wave of new supports just from the 2024-25 government funding. Most schools feel the same pressure as last year, maybe a hair better where growth is biggest and the new averaging helps, maybe tighter where costs outpace the tiny real change.

Change the formula timings to get numbers that favour your agenda. Even small numbers that help are used by governments all day, any day.

Impoverishment.

Thriving turns into surviving. Teacher livelihoods start coming into question. Government funding starts to (slowly) dry up. Assets are sold off. For public system schools and public system teachers, the sharpest fear isn’t abstract, it’s sliding into outright destitution.

Social unravelling.

People move under duress, families are stressed, communities fray, factions start to form or become more visible as the split widens. For those living through it (teachers, parents), these aren’t just side-effects anymore, they are part of the hardship of a public system under stress and a government complicit to see it suffer, just enough so they can jump in at the right time to save the day.

Death of the Existing Teaching Profession Identity.

Currently, Alberta’s default is still a university degree, plus teacher preparation model (i.e. B.Ed or equivalent) for an Interim Professional Certificate to become a real teacher. There are short-term / bridging authorizations but they don’t eliminate the University Bachelorette in Education (B.Ed.) requirement for full certification.[17][18]

In her Sept. 22, 2025 mandate letter to Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides, Premier Danielle Smith directed the ministry to create an abbreviated path into teaching for people with degrees, diplomas or trade credentials (i.e. not necessarily a 4-year B.Ed.).[2][3]

Smith has, in writing, asked for shorter / faster certification routes, potentially accepting diplomas or trades credentials as entry pathways, subject to whatever program the minister brings forward.[2][3][4]

To achieve this and pump-up the Education Minister, our money is on the fact the Alberta government will spotlight teacher supply and classroom capacity to deliver the mandate for abbreviated routes without lowering standards.

Professional identity shifts from credential first to competency proven. Less emphasis on a single degree label for teachers, more on demonstrated practice against the Teaching Quality Standard (a set of professional expectations for teachers that defines competent practice and serves as the basis for teacher certification.).

The Education Minister will likely copy what select U.S. States and England have already been doing for years to achieve this.[19][21][22][24]

Alberta already has small pieces (i.e. CTS Bridge, Letters of Authority) but not a province-wide paid residency / apprenticeship with a published performance bar. The examples above show it’s doable at a provincial scale without lowering standards, if mentorship, assessment, and protected time are funded and enforced.

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Quick Breakout: What are CTS Bridges and Letters of Authority?

Career and Technology Studies (CTS) bridge program provides a pathway for qualified professionals, such as certified journeypersons, to transition into teaching CTS courses (hands-on learning and skills for specific careers).

Letter of Authority: A conditional, short-term teaching certificate issued to individuals who have an approved teacher preparation program but don't immediately qualify for an Alberta Interim Teaching Certificate.

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You can read the framework from England that is basically a blueprint for how to do it in Alberta here.[19][20]

Also, have a look at Louisiana’s, California’s, and Tennessee’s residency/apprenticeship mechanics for how to achieve this in Alberta.[21][22][23][24]

Manufactured scarcity (slow education system famine) makes the government’s agenda easier to sell and to push through. It’s the wrong tool for kids, and it carries big risks.

Why artificial scarcity helps the agenda?

Crisis framing = permission to change. When classrooms and the system are in crisis, it’s easier to argue for emergency fixes. Faster certification, centralized control, rapid charter / independent expansion.

There must be a better way. If the system feels broken, looks broken, you are told it's broken by your government, any alternative that opens seats in schools looks good, even if obligations and supports are weaker.

Softens resistance. Boards, unions, and parents are more likely to accept government options for change when the choice is “this or more crisis.”

Creates policy momentum. A public education system starved and on the brink will generate headlines that justify government Bills, policy, budget reallocations, and permanent structural changes to the provincial education system.

Get ready.

What public education looks like today in Alberta will change after the UCP government is finished.

Now that you have read this information. Use it to inform your next steps and form your own opinions.

Where Bloody Business stands (and why we wrote this):

This piece is for Albertans, to boost government-literacy so you can spot the moving parts and ask better questions. Bloody Business is not pro-government or anti-government; we’re pro-asking questions and making statements only independent journals can with a wink when the jargon gets silly. Nothing stops our membership from taking a stand, specific to any issue. Where do we want to be standing in history and what did we do to inform others?

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Bloody Business