At an elementary school in Hinton, Alta., two of its five vacant teaching positions were never filled before classes started in September. In a small school, it’s the kind of situation that leads to larger classes, split-grades, administrators teaching classes, and other teachers covering gaps.
With no end in sight to the provincewide teachers’ strike — but for educators in small or remote communities, the issues for rural classrooms can be quite different from their urban counterparts.
“It feels like the further away you get from an urban area, the increased difficulty there is,” said Jessie Smeall, a music teacher at École Mountain View School in Hinton, about 280 kilometres west of Edmonton.