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In the booming south Edmonton neighbourhood of Rutherford, library shelves have been pushed into the atrium and hallways of Monsignor Fee Otterson Catholic School to make room for its youngest students.

When the school ran out of classrooms, principal Marie Whelan’s fix was to gather about 40 kindergartners in one large space with plenty of supervision — two teachers and an educational assistant.

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“Everybody would appreciate a smaller class size; I think that’s just human nature,” Whelan said. “But you can work with a larger enrolment in your classrooms as well, if you have the right supports in place.”

More than fifteen years after Alberta’s ballooning class sizes became a flashpoint in an acrimonious teachers’ strike, tales of classes that start the year with more students than desks remain common.

Parents speak of children competing for teachers’ attention, while teachers in turn struggle to meet dozens of students’ complex needs.