Disenchanted complainants and educators say Alberta's new teacher disciplinary body is functioning so poorly, problematic teachers could still be working in classrooms while cases languish.
Nearly two years after a government-appointed commissioner took over policing Alberta teachers, no disciplinary hearings have been held under the new process and certificate revocations have stalled.Disenchanted complainants and educators say Alberta's new teacher disciplinary body is functioning so poorly, problematic teachers could still be working in classrooms while cases languish.
"Instead of going after the bad apples, they're shaking the whole apple tree," one former ATPC employee told CBC News. "Every day I wake up and I'm just waiting for the piano to fall on my head," Derksen said in a September interview. "Every day since this happened, I am in constant fight or flight." When it began operating in January 2023, the ATPC began accepting complaints about any Alberta educator, including private school teachers and superintendents. The commissioner is responsible for deciding which complaints merit investigation, and how complaints should be resolved.Including active cases transferred from former regulatory bodies, the ATPC received 649 complaints in its first 21 months. As of Sept.
Last August, the government called for outside help, issuing an RFP for private investigation services. Alberta Education hired five companies, spending about $135,000 on investigators to work on 16 cases as of mid-September.The five past employees CBC News interviewed all resigned from the organization within the first year.
For example, the college of physicians and surgeons gets about 1,000 complaints a year, a spokesperson said. In 2023, 550 complaints were dismissed outright. That same year, the college conducted 130 investigations. CBC News cannot identify the family because there is a court-ordered publication ban on the identity of their second-oldest child, whose experiences led to their teacher complaints.
"There is no protection for kids," the stepfather said in a September interview. "... It seems like everybody's out to protect themselves." The number of teacher certificates the minister suspended or revoked dropped in 2023. So far in 2024, the minister has suspended one teacher's certificate, according to the
In the video, which disappeared from her private Instagram account after 24 hours, she said she used expletives to tell people who hold discriminatory views to unfollow her account.
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