Alberta Teachers’ Association and Teachers

Employer Bargaining Authority

Memorandum of Agreement—2017 04 24

Highlights of the Agreement

Term

The term is two years—from 2016 09 01 to 2018 08 31.

Salaries and Allowances

There are no increases to the salary grid, substitute teacher rates of pay or the general

increases to allowances over the term of this agreement.

Salary Protection Clause (Me Too)

If a large public sector union (ie, Alberta Union of Provincial Employees or United

Nurses of Alberta) negotiates an increase that applies during the term of this

agreement, the highest such increase will be applied to all salary grids, allowances and

substitute teacher pay.

Salary Grid Advancement

Effective 2017 09 01, ALL experience will count while holding a valid Alberta certificate

or equivalent when teaching in a position that requires a teaching certificate. Effective

2017 09 01, partial years of experience will carry over into the next year.

Benefits

Maternity/Parental and Adoption Leave

Teachers on unpaid maternity, adoption and parental leave may continue to participate

in the benefit plan at their own cost after the board’s payment defined by the collective

agreement has ceased. Teachers now have three options:

1) prepay the premiums prior to starting an unpaid leave of up to one year’s

duration;

2) pay through direct debit during the unpaid leave;

3) the school jurisdiction will continue to pay the employer share of the premiums

during a period of up to twelve months, and the teacher will repay them within one year

of returning to work.

Group Benefits

Teachers Employer Bargaining Authority (TEBA) and the Alberta Teachers’ Association

(Association) will meet to review benefits and leaves, including the benefit carrier for

group benefits and HSA/WSA and prorating sick leave during return-to-work

accommodations. The review will be completed prior to 2018 02 28 and is meant to

inform future bargaining.

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Substitute Teachers

Effective 2017 09 01, all substitute experience within the previous five years will count

for experience on the salary grid.

Administrators

In agreements without reference to a continuous designation for principals, clauses will

be added to collective agreements that enable continuous designations. Effective

2017 09 01, a teacher appointed to a principal designation shall have a probationary

designation of up to two years followed by a term designation of up to three years for a

maximum of five years in total. If the designation continues past this term, it will be

continuous.

For current principals with more than five years of term contracts as of 2017 09 01, the

board has until 2017 12 31 to decide if the appointment will continue in 2018, at which

point it becomes continuous.

In order to transition to the new clauses, current principals who have been on term

contracts for less than five years as of 2017 09 01 will continue on term contracts until a

maximum of five years, at which point, if a contract is renewed, it becomes continuous.

Association Leave and Secondment

Leaves shall be granted to Provincial Executive Council, Professional Conduct and

Practice Review committees and for central and local bargaining committees. Other

leaves may be granted upon written request and will not be unreasonably denied.

The Association will reimburse the board for actual substitute teacher cost plus statutory

benefit premiums (Employment Insurance and Canada Pension Plan).

Secondments shall be granted to members of Provincial Executive Council, Local

Presidents, and any other local official already named in the agreement, with mutual

agreement as to the FTE. The Association pays all costs associated.

Conditions of Practice

The memorandum of agreement contains four main elements related to teacher time:

• Instructional time clauses inserted into all collective agreements that do not have

them

• Assignable time clauses inserted into all collective agreements that do not have

them

• Extension of currently existing sunsetted clauses on instructional and assignable

time

• Compensatory time for teachers working under a compressed instructional calendar.

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Instructional Time

Existing instructional time clauses remain in effect. Those agreements with sunsetted

clauses in which the limit is not 907 hours/year will have those clauses extended to

2018 08 31.

Agreements with sunsetted clauses in which the limit is close to 907 hours/year will now

have permanent clauses with a 907 hours/year limit.

Collective agreements with no instructional time clauses will have an instructional time

clause added, with instructional time capped at 907 hours per school year commencing

in 2017/18.

Assignable Time

Existing assignable time clauses remain in effect. Those agreements with sunsetted

clauses will have those clauses extended to 2018 08 31.

Collective agreements with no assignable time clauses will have an assignable time

clause added, with assignable time capped at 1200 hours per school year commencing

in 2017/18.

Assignable Time Definition

Assignable time will be defined in the collective agreements as the amount of time that

school jurisdictions assign teachers and within which they require teachers to fulfill

various professional duties and responsibilities including, but not limited to, instruction,

supervision, noninstructional days, professional and staff development, and staff

meetings.

Compressed School Year

Students must be provided with a certain number of hours of instruction per year to

meet Alberta Education regulations (950 hours in elementary/jr high, 1000 hours in high

school). These hours may be offered over a varied number of school days. The fewer

the number of days, the longer each day needs to be to meet the regulation.

In some jurisdictions, school boards have allocated fewer days for instruction where

teachers provide the same instructional time over fewer, longer days. However, the

School Act sets the maximum school year for teachers at 200 days. With fewer

instructional days, more noninstructional days may be designated for teachers, up to the

School Act maximum of 200 days. For example, the school calendar with 177

instructional days may include up to 23 noninstructional days as opposed to the school

calendar with 188 instructional days where only 12 noninstructional days may be

assigned. Teachers working in schools with fewer days are providing the same

instructional work as those with more days and, in many cases, providing additional

service.

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A letter of understanding will be appended to each collective agreement requiring

jurisdictions with fewer than 183 instructional days to provide a minimum reduction of

0.5 days of noninstructional time for each instructional day below 183. For example, if

there are 175 instructional days, teachers may not be required to work for more than a

total of 196 days.

TEBA and the Association will meet to review and evaluate the compression process

outlined in the letter of understanding.

Teacher Professional Growth Plans

Teachers will have autonomy over their growth plans. Plans will consider but will not be

required to include school or jurisdictional goals.

Part-time Teachers

Part-time FTEs will be determined as a ratio of the teacher’s annual instructional time

compared to the annual instructional time for a full-time teacher at the same school.

Classroom Improvement Fund (CIF)

During the 2017/18 school year, $75,000,000 will be provided to school jurisdictions on

a per pupil basis to use for classroom improvement such as hiring additional teachers,

classroom assistants, student-specific professional development needs or materials for

the classroom.

Funds will be distributed as determined by the majority decision of a joint committee of

up to 10 representatives, with half of the members named by Association and the other

half by the school board. The committee structure and mandate will be included in each

collective agreement.