Back to school — but not back to normal.

As Ontario students head through the doors on Tuesday, many will be in bigger classes at schools that have fewer teachers. Meanwhile, the threat of labour strife looms, given all education contracts expired over the Labour Day weekend with no new deals in sight.

Education Minister Stephen Lecce says he wants to “get the deal that our kids deserve,” and is “calling on all parties to work harder, smarter and faster” to get there because “parents ought to have that predictability.”

“Students will not face any disruptions to the start of the school year,” he also promised.

But without contracts, it is unclear how long that can last. Laura Walton, who heads the school board council of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), said it is planning job action this fall after asking for a conciliator to aid in negotiations this summer. CUPE is holding strike votes over the next two weeks.

On Tuesday, school support staff “are all going back to our schools to the jobs that we love. But (families) are going to see a reduction in services — a lot of our job losses happened over the summer,” Walton said.

Sally Meseret, a Grade 12 student and president of the Ontario Student Trustees’ Association (OSTA), said “there’s a heightened awareness” and anxiety about the Ford government’s changes to education, which polls suggest are highly unpopular with the public.

“The biggest focus we have is making sure that as many students as possible can leave this education system feeling like they are capable of continuing on and being successful contributors to society,” said Meseret, a student trustee with the Durham District School Board. “That starts with making sure that we adequately staff our schools. When we don’t, student outcomes are impacted.”

In order to balance the books, the Toronto District School Board cut almost 300 staff members, including reading coaches, social workers and custodians. Among high school teachers, 135 full-time positions remain laid off, although the board anticipates some may be recalled in the coming months.

Across the province, high schools have shed teachers because of the province’s plan to increase the average class size from 22 students to 28 over the next four years. Despite a fund to ensure no teacher is laid off because of the changes, unions expect that some may be. Other teachers, meanwhile, have been bumped from full-time permanent jobs into long-term occasional supply jobs. Still others wait to find out where they’ll land, if anywhere.

“I don’t think we’re going to know the complete impact of that until we get into schools,” said Cathy Abraham, president of the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association. “Boards across the province have to make difficult decisions about cancelling courses and making classes larger.”

She said job losses have resulted not only from class size changes, but also from previous budget cuts.

“You can definitely feel it in the air, that this year is different,” said Taylor Dallin, a Grade 12 student and Toronto Catholic District School Board student trustee. She said conversations with peers, and on social media, “are dominated by ‘What’s our future going to look like?’”

“A lot of students are heading into this year feeling anxious and, quite frankly, scared as well because what’s going to happen this year is unknown,” said Dallin, who attends Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts — a school that has been forced to cancel all Grade 12 arts classes in the second semester.

“We know how important having one-on-one time with teachers is, having a small environment where people feel comfortable to ask questions and get help if they need it. But the class size increase is definitely going to shift that.”

Glen Hodgson, who heads the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation local in the Near North District School Board, said this much uncertainty is unusual at this time of year.

“Boards are hiring people, but we are starting school and we don’t have all the staff in place,” said Hodgson. “Never has it been this chaotic.”

The Near North board initially sent out surplus notices to half of its secondary school teachers — 121 of 240 — and 31 now remain on the “redundant” list, he said. Teachers who have been placed have, in some cases, been moved to schools two hours away and are facing commutes from places like Parry Sound to North Bay.

“The board is doing its best,” he added, “but we are dealing with fallout from the government.”

A number of public boards — Durham, York, Trillium Lakelands, Upper Grand, Niagara, Ottawa-Carleton, Algoma, Superior-Greenstone — report no teacher layoffs, as did the Toronto Catholic board.

In Hamilton, 74 teachers were declared redundant at the end of the school year, but 22 have since been recalled. “Although there remain 52 redundant teachers at the secondary level, all have been offered a temporary teaching assignment for the first semester,” said director Manny Figueiredo.

The Limestone board, in the Kingston area, said two teachers have yet to be placed for the fall, and 14 have been moved from permanent jobs into long-term occasional ones. In the second semester, however, 37 remain without positions.

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The Peel board had 68 teachers on recall, with 47 placed into year-long occasional positions and 15 in positions lasting at least one semester.

Toronto teacher Linda Kirvan is still waiting to hear if she has a position for this school year. “Like most teachers, I am very organized and like to plan,” she said. “So I really hate being in a position that feels like utter chaos … Even if I get placed … I will not have been there for the first day and that is an important one.”

Liz Stuart, president of the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association, said what’s happening this year is “just the tip of the iceberg.”

“This is a four-year-plan by the government, so next year there will be more,” Stuart said. “And that’s just the reality.”

Harvey Bischof, president of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation, said his union is awaiting a decision from the labour board over what is to be negotiated centrally and locally in the two-tier bargaining process.

“My members — support staff and teachers — will be at work Tuesday doing their best to provide the best educational opportunities they can for our students,” Bischof said. “But they’ll be doing that within a system that’s already feeling the negative effects of these policy decisions” that have led to “thousands fewer course options and hundreds and hundreds of support staff and teacher positions that have been lost to the system.”

NDP education critic Marit Stiles said she’s heard from parents and students who worry about “courses that have been cancelled, favoured teachers that won’t be there this year. Kids are already anxious about high school. Add this and it causes a lot of anxiety.”

Budding artist Ema Ines, a student at Cardinal Carter in Toronto, is disappointed that all Grade 12 arts classes have been cancelled at her school for the second semester.

“I’m definitely upset,” said Ines, who plans to pursue arts in university. “I want to learn and grow as an artist and experience new things.”

Jade Bilodeau, a Grade 12 student and the Catholic board council president of OSTA, says students provincewide are worried about “the increase in class size and how it might affect their schedules, academic achievement, course selection and overall educational experience.”

Bilodeau, who is also a student trustee with the Niagara Catholic District School Board, said OSTA wants the Education Ministry to “re-evaluate plans to further increase class sizes” in high schools.

Lecce was appointed education minister in a cabinet shuffle in June, and says he has spent the summer listening to parents, students and educators about their priorities. He recently re-announced restrictions on cellphones in classrooms and extra mental health and math supports, and promised a math curriculum overhaul next year.

He also released an updated sex-ed curriculum, and noted the government is spending $24 billion on education — a $700-million increase, though it’s largely because of increased enrolment and the Ford government’s new child care tax rebate — and says more money is being targeted for things like special education.

Lecce has said high school class sizes remain comparable to last year, at an average of 22.5 students, and has described reports of growing class sizes as “hyperbole.”

But boards have boosted their secondary class sizes, after being told last spring to move to an average of 28 students over the next four years, and that plan is still in place. While smaller boards with smaller populations keep that average down, the Toronto public board has bumped up its average high school class size to 23.6 students, and Halton has increased its to 24.85.

Lecce said class sizes are something that will be raised at the bargaining table, and has asked the unions to find savings elsewhere to bring them down. He said other job losses are due to the end of certain grants that are also part of negotiations.

An analysis by the Star showed that with the teacher job losses, two of the province’s largest boards — the Toronto and York public boards — have cut hundreds of classes or sections, with anywhere from one-quarter to one-half of the affected offerings being in science and technology, two areas the government has said it wants to focus on.