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As students in Calgary’s public schools face the loss of school psychologists next month, other districts in and around Calgary are choosing to keep that high level of expertise in spite of provincial funding cuts due to COVID-19.

With student and family stress rapidly rising — especially as the school year winds down and final assessments loom — Rocky View Schools surrounding Calgary as well as the Calgary Catholic School District have confirmed they will not lay off any of their psychologists.

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“We chose to keep all of our therapists and psychologists. They are just too vital to the continuing success of our students right now,” said Bryan Szumlas, superintendent for CCSD.

“We had a $10-million problem to solve in relation to cutbacks . . . And the message from the province was for each jurisdiction to make their own decisions.

“We chose to keep our psychologists — they are very highly trained and they bring a very unique skill set that is not available to us in any other employee group.”