The Manitoba government’s smaller classes initiative has led to 130 teachers being hired in partnership with school divisions throughout the province this year alone, bringing the total number of teachers hired in the first two years of the initiative to 213. This announcement was made by Education and Advanced Learning Minister James Allum.
“Our government is continuing to move forward on this important initiative because we know that more one-on-one time with teachers during the critical early years will lay a strong foundation for student success in the years to come. We are extremely pleased to have over 200 more teachers in the last two years helping our children develop a strong foundation in math, reading and writing early on when it counts the most,” said Minister Allum.
In less than two years, he added, there have been positive results from the smaller classes initiative including:
- the creation of 225 more kindergarten to Grade 3 classes;
- the creation of 437 more kindergarten to Grade 3 classes with 20 or fewer students; and
- the reduction of 261 kindergarten to Grade 3 classes with 24 or greater students, representing a 41 per cent reduction in the number of classes with 24 or more students since the beginning of the initiative.
“Smaller classes are a key component of our government’s strategy to improve the quality of our education. Having a strong foundation in math, reading and writing is crucial to success later in life and that’s why our government has invested over $7 million to hire more teachers and reduce the number of large classrooms,” Minister Allum said.
Other provincial initiatives to improve the quality of Manitoba’s education system include:
- a back-to-basics approach to the English and French language arts curriculum, ensuring students are getting foundational skills in reading, grammar, spelling and punctuation;
- renovating science labs to equip them with the latest technology for use with a new science curriculum;
- introducing a new parent-friendly curriculum website and plain-language report card to give parents the information they need to help their children thrive in school;
- investing over $1 billion since 1999 to build or replace over 30 schools and renovate classrooms, gyms and science labs;
- a back-to-basics approach to math, increasing funding for the Early Numeracy Initiative to support school divisions with design and implementation of numeracy programming, and teacher professional development to improve students’ math skills in kindergarten to Grade 8; and
- implementing a new assessment policy to ensure more rigorous standards in schools.
School divisions in Manitoba are required to cap their kindergarten to Grade 3 classrooms at 20 students by September 2017. While 10 per cent of classrooms per division will be allowed the flexibility to go beyond the cap of 20 students, no classes will be permitted to have more than 23 students in a kindergarten to Grade 3 classroom.
School divisions are required to post class sizes of all kindergarten to Grade 3 classes in their schools. This information is available on school division websites. Further information on the smaller class size initiative can be found at www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/schools.
