For lack of registrations, the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM) had to suspend its bachelor’s degree in teaching in school and social adaptation in secondary school for the first time in its history, learned The duty. The decision fuels fears about the labor shortage and its impact in classrooms.
Earlier this month, people who had applied for this program received a message from the UQAM registrar notifying them that the program had been stopped “for an indefinite period starting in the fall term of 2023”.
Asked by The duty, the University confirmed the information. “Admissions will be reopened in 2024”, specifies the director of the communications department, Caroline Tessier.
In an interview, Professor Catherine Turcotte explains that the “secondary” component of the baccalaureate only attracted six candidates. “There have always been fewer people in secondary than in primary, but having fewer than ten has never happened before this year. This is not good news for the field,” says the professor from the Department of Specialized Education and Training at UQAM.
Mme Turcotte is part of the program committee that decided to suspend the baccalaureate. The students who were registered there were mostly redirected to the “primary” component of the baccalaureate, she underlines.
This component has also attracted even more students than it can accommodate, or 120, notes the professor. “How is it that CEGEP students are less and less interested in secondary education in special education? That’s my big question, ”she drops.
Less interest in high school
The situation facing UQAM is not unique. At the University of Montreal, there were on average 20 graduates in the secondary component of the baccalaureate in school adaptation in the last two years, notes the head of this study program, Élodie Marion. For the school years from 2023 to 2025, that projected average drops to nine, she adds.
In 2022-2023, only six students chose the secondary option at the University of Montreal, while 77 expressed an interest in primary, notes the vice-dean for undergraduate studies of this same university, Josianne Robert.
At the Lévis campus of the Université du Québec à Rimouski (UQAR), approximately 73 students chose the primary option. For secondary school, about fifteen raised their hands, notes Professor Mélanie Tremblay.
However, “compared to needs, when we look at the postings of school service centers, there is a lot of demand for teachers in preschool and elementary school or in special education in secondary school, notes Élodie Marion. This is a field where there is really demand. »
In general, special education attracts fewer students over the years at UQAM and the University of Montreal. Enrollments at the Université de Sherbrooke and UQAR are on the rise.
Problems on the ground
Special education, “it is an expertise that is increasingly rare”, laments Catherine Turcotte. Rachel Berthiaume, professor of didactics at the University of Montreal, “is very concerned” about the decline in interest in this field, which makes it possible to intervene with students with disabilities or with learning difficulties or adaptation.
“The remedial teacher is most likely to find himself in any type of class because we lack it and we have to meet the most pressing needs,” says Ms.me Berthiaume. Result: students trained to intervene in primary school will be able to find themselves in secondary school classes. ” [Pourtant], we are in a reality that will be different. A teenager obviously does not have the same daily life as a child in primary school. »
Élodie Marion evokes greater impacts in Quebec society. “If we don’t have qualified people to support these teenagers who are in difficulty, to ensure that there is successful social and professional integration, as a society, that also complicates the follow-up in terms of costs and support,” she says.
“The question we ask ourselves is: “Is this an accident or the start of a trend?” asks the president of the Autonomous Federation of Education, Mélanie Hubert. “With the shortened training courses announced, our fear is that young people will say to themselves: ‘Why do a four-year course when I can go and train [durant une période] less?” »
Mélanie Tremblay, from UQAR, adds to the same theme. “Knowing that we are training fewer and fewer students for the secondary profile, we risk calling on [enseignants] not legally qualified,” she recalls.
In fact, the demand is already there on the ground, points out Jean Bélanger, dean of the Faculty of Education at UQAM. “There are school service centers that tell us: ‘What can you do for us?’ We are seeing what we could offer to support non-legally qualified staff with training that could lead to their qualification,” he says.