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An effort is underway to remove public funding for independent schools in Alberta. It’s not coming from the UCP government. It’s not even coming from the opposition NDP. It’s coming from one public school teacher. 

On October 7, Elections Alberta approved an Alberta Fund Public Schools citizen initiative that asks, “Should the Government of Alberta end its current practice of allocating public funds to accredited independent (private) schools?” 

What’s a citizen initiative? 

Such citizen initiatives are a relatively new thing in Alberta, though the concept is a familiar one. A successful citizen initiative requires the government to either draft a new law, policy, or constitutional amendment or hold a referendum on a particular issue. The modern form of citizen initiatives was introduced by the Citizen Initiative Act passed in 2021. 

The original Citizen Initiative Act required that, for a citizen initiative to move forward, 10% of eligible voters must sign a petition supporting the initiative. Under these rules, a petition would need 293,976 signatures collected over 90 days to move forward. However, in July, the government amended the Citizen Initiative Act to require only 10% of the number of voters who actually voted in the last election for it to move forward.  Since only 40-70% of eligible voters turn out to vote in provincial elections, this change significantly lowered the number of signatures needed. Now, a citizen initiative only needs 177,732 to move ahead. 

The change also lengthened the signature collection period to 120 days. In this case, the signature collection process began on October 14. Signatures can be collected until February 11.  

What’s the likelihood that this succeeds? 

The Citizen Initiative Act only allows paper petitions, making it difficult to collect 177,732 signatures.  

To put these numbers into context, the official petition with the greatest number of signatures in recent federal Canadian history was a 2023 petition that expressed a lack of confidence in the Trudeau government and called for a general election. It garnered 387,487 signatures. But that petition was conducted online and open to all Canadians, not limited to pen and paper signatures in one province. 

But one recent citizen initiative in Alberta did meet the required threshold. Earlier this year, a former deputy premier of Alberta launched the Forever Canadian petition that declares Albertans’ desire to remain in Canada and counter the call for Alberta to separate from the rest of Canada. That paper petition, which closed last week, received 456,388 signatures. Elections Alberta is currently verifying the signatures and will publish the results of the petition by January 6. 

A couple of things give the Alberta Fund Public Schools petition a shot at reaching the signature threshold.  

First of all, public school teachers have the organizational means to get paper signatures. The Alberta Teachers’ Association (ATA) represents approximately 46,000 teachers across the province. The ATA generally opposes the government funding of independent schools, claiming that any money that goes to independent schools comes at the expense of public schools. If the ATA was able to get every public school teacher to sign the petition, and that teacher was able to get their spouse and two relatives or friends to sign, the petition would reach the required number of signatures without the need to canvas the general public at all. 

Second, the state of public education is already in many citizens’ minds. On October 6, public school teachers went on strike, cancelling school for three and a half weeks. The strike only ended because the government passed legislation ordering teachers to go back to work. All of this has made supporters of the public education system angry, perhaps angry enough to sign the Alberta Funds Public Schools petition en masse. 

That said, as of November 10, with 92 days left in the signing period, the Alberta Fund Public Schools has 13,799 signatures. At this pace, the petition is on track to get 135,450 signatures, short of the required 177,732. 

What’s at stake? 

Nearly half a billion dollars in public funding for independent schools. 

Alberta is the most generous province to the typical independent school. Ontario and the Maritime provinces provide no financial assistance to independent schools. Most independent schools in British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba receive 50% of the equivalent public school funding. That figure rises to 60% in Quebec. The Alberta government subsidizes most independent schools with 70% of the base instructional grant for public schools.  

As generous as Alberta is towards independent schools compared to the other Canadian provinces, the most just policy would be for provincial governments to fund independent schools the same as public schools. Currently, the government is playing favourites, privileging government-run schools over independently-run schools. This despite the fact that most independent schools provide a similar (or even superior) quality of education. 

According to the government’s enrolment records and budget, the government spends $461 million on 48,024 independent school students. That works out to about $9600 per student. If the government were to pull all funding from independent schools, schools would look to comparable tuition increases to cover the gap. Under this scenario, the average family with four kids in school could be asked to fork over a further $38,000 per year if this petition is successful. 

It’s a stretch to say that defunding independent schools is an existential threat. Independent schools in provinces like Ontario operate without any public funding. But the removal of funding would almost certainly lead to a significant decline in the number of students attending independent schools, as parents are squeezed financially. 

Why the push? 

The application for the citizen initiative lists four reasons for the campaign. 

Reason #1: The majority of Albertans agree that public funds should only be used to fund public schools.  

This is factually true. A recent poll by Angus Reid found that 35% of Albertans want independent schools to be defunded, 25% think they should receive less money, 23% opine that they should continue to receive the same level of funding, and 10% desire more funding for independent schools. 

But just because something is politically popular doesn’t mean that it is the morally right choice. The voice of the people is not the voice of God. As mentioned above, the most just and equitable solution would be for the government to fund all educational institutions equally, rather than favouring government-run schools. 

Reason #2: Public Schools include Public, Catholic, and Francophone schools that are open to all students, without payment of tuition.  

Again, this is true enough. Alberta has the greatest diversity of school choice in the public system. They even have charter schools, which are public schools run by independent boards. 

Of course, the only reason that such schools admit all students without the payment of tuition is because the government fully funds them! If the government fully funded independent schools as well, most of them wouldn’t charge (much) tuition either.  

Independent schools do have restrictions on who can attend their schools. Some public schools do as well. But that doesn’t have to be framed as an exclusionary model. Public schools operate more or less on the model of requiring a diversity of students to attend a uniform set of schools. Independent schools operate on the idea that there should be a more uniform student body within a diverse set of schools. That change of emphasis need not make independent schools ineligible to receive public funding, especially when independent schools save the government money and often have better educational outcomes than public schools. 

Reason #3: A strong public education system, with choice, excellence, and inclusion, benefits all citizens of our province.  

There is little evidence that a government has to rely on an entirely public system to achieve this. In fact, the provinces that fund independent schools the most and thus have the highest proportions of independent school enrollment – Quebec, Alberta, and British Columbia – tend to outperform other provinces that provide no financial assistance to independent schools. Beyond academic performance, independent schools tend to produce better citizens. There is a strong body of evidence that a robust independent school system bolsters the performance of the entire education system. 

Reason #4: Diverting public funds back into public schools would help alleviate some of the funding shortages that public schools have been experiencing.  

On its face, this is true. Giving public schools more money would reduce funding shortages. But there is no requirement in the petition or the public finance that the government reallocate any cancelled funding for independent schools to the public school system. They could simply save that money or reallocate it to other areas where it is needed more (e.g. health care). 

Furthermore, the implicit idea behind this fourth reason is that pumping more money into education automatically leads to better educational outcomes. The focus becomes on how much money the government is spending rather than how well students are faring. It is true that Alberta spends the least amount of money per student ($13,494 per student). But Alberta also has some of the best student outcomes in the country. Alberta should pride itself on getting so much bang for their buck. 

Finally, withdrawing partial funding to independent schools might not end up saving the government much money. That $461 million per year would not be going to independent schools, but if enough independent school students switched to the public system because they simply couldn’t afford far higher tuition rates, the government might have to spend even more money on the public system. After all, the government only subsidizes independent schools to the tune of 70% of the operating costs of the local public school. It (currently) does not cover the capital costs (e.g. the building itself) of independent schools either. But the government covers 100% of public schools’ operating costs and would have to build more public schools if there were an influx of students. 

So what can you do? 

Right now, the big concern is that public school supporters may get enough signatures for this citizen’s initiative to move forward. If they get enough signatures, the government must respond. There isn’t really anything that we can do to stop people from signing the petition. But we can still advocate for independent schools. If this citizen initiative does get enough signatures and eventually triggers a referendum, then making the case for independent schools to our neighbours and community members will be indispensable. Their votes will count. But right now, it is also worth reaching out to your MLA, the Education Minister, and Premier Smith, encouraging them to support independent schools as much as they can.