Alberta teachers grill UCP leadership candidates about new curriculum, education plans

Alberta teachers got a chance to ask United Conservative Party leadership candidates about their plans for education on Wednesday.

Six of the seven candidates running for UCP leadership took questions submitted by teachers at the annual summer conference hosted by the Alberta Teachers' Association. 

The controversial new curriculum for Alberta schools was a main theme of the candidates' forum, which took place at the Kinnear Centre in Banff. 

Candidate Leela Aheer said the curriculum as a whole isn't where it needs to be and government must get more input on it from educators. She said as leader she wouldn't make any education decisions without consulting with teachers.

"My door will always be open," Aheer said. 

"I'm not going to make you any promises because my job isn't to promise you. My job is to work with you."

Both Rajan Sawhney and Rebecca Schulz argued the development and implementation of the new curriculum should be halted for now. Schulz added the extra pressure is not needed especially as teachers try to bring students back up to grade level for subjects like math and reading, which took a hit during the pandemic.

"I don't think it is fair to ask teachers to then also be giving a whole bunch of feedback on curriculum development moving forward as we're trying to get kids caught up," Schulz said.

The new curriculum for K-6 will be phased in this fall.

Perceived frontrunner Danielle Smith also proposed pausing the curriculum changes until students are back on track after the difficulties of the pandemic.

"The most important thing we need to do is stabilize what is going on in the classrooms.... we don't want to have kids push through without foundational skills," she said.

Candidate Todd Loewen said the right approach is to not completely throw out the curriculum and start from scratch.

"I think we have an opportunity to fix and correct any of the issues we have, both on implementation and actually the curriculum itself," he said.

Former Wildrose Party leader Brian Jean said he would make the curriculum a pilot project and review it in the coming spring so teachers can decide for themselves if they want to continue with it.