It didn't have to end this way

This week, close to 40 of my former colleagues were handed their termination notices.

40 or more others took a buyout in the weeks preceding the terminations. A similar number of support staff are losing their jobs. This follows a massive buyout of senior staff  two years ago when Alberta Distance Learning Centre restructured itself in a desperate bid to retain its longstanding government funding. 

All for nothing in this government's relentless quest to reduce services to Albertans.

For nearly a hundred years, Alberta Distance Learning Centre has provided educational opportunities to Alberta's kids. From its humble beginnings as a one woman show in the back room of the legislature to its heyday with more than 30,000 students in schools and homes all over the world, ADLC has changed and grown in its quest to meet the needs of kids from virtually every walk of life. From kids living on remote farms, to families who moved abroad for work, to kids with addictions, to kids staying home to care for disabled parents, to gifted kids looking for enrichment, to adult students who fell through the cracks when they were younger.  Kids with mobility issues and mental health issues and autoimmune disorders. Elite athletes and aspiring entrepreneurs. Students in small schools that cannot offer a full range of programming. Students wanting to learn another language or explore areas of interest such as Aboriginal Studies or forestry. Students who lost every worldly good due to fire and flood. Students from large schools who don't fit it. From First Nations to recent immigrants. Christians and Muslims and those whose life experiences have left them with nothing to believe in. Teachers in outreach centres and private schools. And most recently, teachers and students who work remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

All of these-thousands of people-were able to use ADLC to teach and learn.

All were welcome. 

"Success for every student" was not just a motto. It was something we believed in and worked to achieve.

Through the decades, ADLC teachers experimented with all kinds of technology to engage kids. Lessons delivered via CKUA radio. Television programming through the now-defunct ACCESS TV. Telephone conferencing. Online learning. Interactive virtual labs. Personalized instruction. Video conferencing. Forestry and rig simulators. ADLC and its programming was recognized throughout the world. 

I spent 20 years trying to make course content come alive for thousands of kids. So did dozens of my colleagues who created and revised hundreds of courses at all grade levels. I don't know what will happen to the resources we so painstakingly created and left to others to tend. Left to a faceless bureaucrat to maintain until they wither and die from neglect, I imagine.

As the threats to defund escalated, the restructuring began. Teachers who previously worked in communities across the province were brought back to the mothership in Barrhead, transferred or offered buyouts, removing almost all institutional memory from the school. Regional offices closed. The time-tested, flexible and cost-effective marker model was eliminated. Services to adults were withdrawn. Summer school opportunities were reduced and then eliminated. It's not what I would have done. But it wasn't up to me. 

When the announcement that funding would be phased out, rather than face death through a thousand cuts, ADLC decided it would close early, rather than try to do the impossible. It will close its doors for good in June 2021.

It is hard to know who to blame for this travesty. Certainly the government must accept the lion's share of the blame. But Alberta Education began the defunding process long before the UCP was elected.  

Large boards like Calgary Public and Edmonton Public, with their own distributed learning platforms have long resented what they perceived as an unfair funding formula that favoured ADLC - despite the fact that  they themselves benefitted from its province-wide mandate. They lobbied for funding to end. Ironically, thousands of students and families from Alberta's two largest cities make up the bulk of students at ADLC and its sister school, Vista Virtual. Make of that what you will.

Sadly, more than 60% of Alberta's superintendents said they did not need ADLC. Apparently the thousands of students from their schools who use ADLC can receive instruction at the hands of their own already overtaxed teachers who will now be expected to create their own materials and complete their own assessments. Or perhaps their schools can buy courses from Pearson or another corporation with a for-profit motive. Or maybe those students just will not have their needs met. Superintendents can take some responsibility as well.

Did local officials fight hard enough to retain this valuable resource? I don't know what they did or didn't do. Whatever it was, it wasn't enough.

Maybe it doesn't matter who is to blame.  Alberta's students will suffer. 

And that makes my heart hurt.

I will honour the rich history and dedication of those who built Alberta Distance Learning Centre. Not only for their expertise, dedication, creativity, and vision but also for their very real love for their students. Alberta has lost a vital resource. 

It did not have to end this way.