Schools in Surrey will be grappling with even fewer education assistants in classrooms as the district will be cutting about 50 positions.

The news is "devastating" for CUPE 728 president Tammy Murphy, who in part represents education assistants, or as Surrey Schools refers to them, inclusive education support workers (IESWs).

"It's frustrating. We have a bunch of children in need who are already struggling to get time and now they are going to have even less time with education assistants," Murphy told Peace Arch News on Monday (April 14), adding that no one saw this coming.

"I don't know how they (the district) can justify it, and I hope people are outraged. We are taking away from our most vulnerable students."

Announced at the tail end of the public school board meeting last week on Wednesday (April 9), trustee Terry Allen shared that the district will be cutting between 40 and 50 full-time IESW positions through employee attrition. Meaning, when current IESWs resign or retire, up to 50 of those vacant positions will not be refilled with new hires.

"The district employs about 1,677 budgeted IESWs across 126-plus schools. This is not a reflection of their contributions, which are significant and valued," Allen said.

The decision from the board comes down as the district looks to make $16 million worth of cuts next year due to a budget shortfall. 

With more than 82,000 students in the district, Murphy says IESW positions have been lacking for years, and this next blow will make the situation "even worse."

"I think people are going to leave because the workload is already too large. We're running from student to student. I think this will be a huge issue and it's just going to make it worse," she added. "If we're making cuts, why aren't we cutting management positions? Why aren't we cutting wage increases (for upper management)?... I'm not sure, but I think it's the easiest to cut, but I don't know why they would cut EA positions when we're not nearly paid as much as other positions, we have less hours than other positions in the district. It's disappointing."

To get an idea of how the situation currently looks, the CUPE president shares that already, more than 1,000 IESW days are not being filled each month. Murphy confidently states that most if not all schools in the district already do not have enough IESWs for the need.

"That's 1,000 kids going without service and trying to cut corners to take care of these kids and now we have less.

"Already there's not enough EAs to fill them... It's going to put a much harder burden on EAs who are already working in short."

The board says this decision is a direct result of not enough funding in education and in Surrey from the B.C. Ministry of Education.

"I can鈥檛 say enough how disappointed this board is in the government鈥檚 response to this budget deficit, which is over $16 million, and also our request for new schools across this huge and continually growing district," Allen said.

"I don鈥檛 think in all my years on the board that I鈥檝e ever been this disappointed in the government for its response on the needs of a district of this size."

Chair Gary Tymoschuk said that while the ministry has provided more money to Surrey over the years, with the rate of inflation and increase in student enrolment, it is not more money per student.

Superintendent Mark Pearmain also sent a video to staff on Friday informing them of the IESW decision and to share more information on the district's budget. For the operating budget, Pearmain shared that the district has $933 million this year in comparison to $912 million in 2024.

"The growth only covers student enrolment growth and the existing labour settlement agreements," Pearmain stated, adding that he hopes staff will reach out with any questions or concerns, acknowledging that budgeting this year has been a challenge.

In addition to the cutting of positions, the role of an IESW is also changing, Murphy was told on Friday.

"We've also been told that we don't cover students who require academic support anymore, that that's not something the district can do with the amount of education assistants they have," Murphy said.

"If they're telling us we don't provide academic support anymore and we have to provide personal care and behaviour and things like that, that's not enough. We're education assistants, we're supposed to be assisting in education, but we don't have the ability to do that anymore."

The reasoning behind this change is, once again, lack of funding, Murphy says management informed her.

"I've been an EA for 27 years. ... We learn the lesson with the kids and we adapt it to make it so kids can learn, that's what we do," Murphy emphasized.

"I'm hoping that things will change back, I'm hoping that the government will put more money into education, I'm hoping the school district will reallocate funds to student care."

CUPE 728 will be sending another request to Education Minister Lisa Beare for a meeting, which was previously declined, as well as meetings with the district and national unions.

Peace Arch News has reached out to Surrey Schools for additional comment.