Quebec Education Minister Bernard Drainville gives an update on this year's back to school situation during a news conference August 16 in Montreal. Quebec's education minister says there are still 5,704 teaching positions to be filled days before the fall school term begins. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz

MONTREAL - There are still 5,704 vacant teaching positions in Quebec with the new school year less than two weeks away, and Education Minister Bernard Drainville said Friday the gap is partly due to immigration.

He told reporters the school system faces a serious challenge to find enough teachers because there are about 20,000 more students enrolled than there were last year. About 80 per cent of them are newcomers to the province, he added.

Drainville said immigration "has a big impact on our school system." Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has to "help us a bit," he said, and the federal government should "get control of the immigration process to reduce temporary immigration in Quebec, particularly asylum seekers."

According to Statistics Canada data published in June, there were 597,000 non-permanent residents in Quebec in the second quarter of 2024, including 190,000 asylum seekers. That's up from 420,000 temporary residents a year earlier and 295,000 in 2022.

While he said it's not the fault of immigrants, "I'm sounding the alarm a bit because we've reached our limit." He noted a lack of resources for the kindergarten program for four-year-olds due to the need for French integration classes.

While the number of teaching vacancies is high, it is 2,800 fewer compared with this time last year, Drainville told reporters. Overall, he said, the news is "positive." Of the 5,704 unfilled teaching spots, 1,406 are for permanent, full-time positions, and the rest are contract jobs.

Drainville said the fact there are fewer unfilled positions compared with last year is due in part to a new collective agreement that requires teachers to accept class assignments by Aug. 8. Unions, however, have said that despite the change in the contract, the education network is still dealing with a serious labour shortage.

Mélanie Hubert, president of the FAE teachers union, said the minister's numbers are incomplete because they don't provide a full picture of how many support staff positions are unfilled.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 16, 2024.

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