Ontario teacher shortage to worsen in 2027, ministry document warns

Ontario is staring down a teacher shortage as retirements and student enrolment are both on the rise, and the Ministry of Education expects the situation will start to get even worse in 2027.

The warning is contained in a series of briefing documents for the new minister of education, obtained by The Canadian Press through a freedom-of-information request.

Many school boards in Ontario and elsewhere are experiencing challenges recruiting and retaining enough qualified teachers, the document says, and in Ontario the issue is particularly felt in areas such as French and tech education.

"Modelling projects that student enrolment over the coming years is expected to increase along with teacher retirements, while the supply of new teachers is to remain stable, absent intervention," the briefing says.

"These factors are projected to result in a growing gap between the number of teachers needed and the number of teachers available. This (projected) gap is expected to widen beginning in 2027."

Word of teacher supply and demand struggles is not new to the unions representing Ontario's teachers, who say one of the main issues is working conditions, including violence in classrooms, too few special education supports, and not enough money for classroom supplies.

"The conditions in the classroom are deteriorating," said Karen Brown, president of the Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario.

"We have members within their first five years just leaving the profession ... It's troubling that this government knows that there are some issues with retention and recruitment and that they're actually not wanting to address them."

A spokesperson for Education Minister Jill Dunlop said in a statement that the government has introduced a number of measures, including halving processing timelines for domestic and international applicants, allowing second-year teaching candidates to work as supply teachers, and replacing seniority-based hiring with a merit-based system for quicker recruitment of staff.

"School boards and education unions need to do their part by creating a serious plan to improve teacher absenteeism with better attendance management practices that ensure students are continually taught by qualified educators in the classrooms now and into the future," Edyta McKay wrote.

A decade ago, Ontario had a teacher surplus, with an unemployment rate of nearly 40 per cent for teachers in their first year after becoming certified.

In 2015, the then-Liberal government made teachers' college two years instead of one and admission rates plummeted from more than 7,600 in 2011 to 4,500 in 2021 — and now early-career unemployment is at "statistically negligible levels," according to the Ontario College of Teachers.

It may be time to review that program, said Karen Littlewood, president of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation.

"I'm sure they're filling the two years with lots of meaningful teaching and learning, but maybe we need to look at compacting it," she said.