Busy tutors, lagging diploma exam results suggest Fort McMurray students are struggling

Students in Fort McMurray underperformed on diploma exams during the last school year, according to annual education results reports from the public and Catholic school divisions.

In 2022-23, 80 per cent of Alberta students earned the "acceptable standard" of at least 50 per cent on diploma exams, but the percentages of students who did so in Fort McMurray's two biggest school divisions were lower.

Sixty-six per cent of diploma-exam-writing students in Fort McMurray Public Schools and 70 per cent in Fort McMurray Catholic Schools met that bar.

Both school divisions also had smaller shares of students earning 80 per cent or higher on diploma exams, compared to the 21 per cent of Alberta students who achieved that "standard of excellence."

"These results are concerning and require the results from each subject area to be analyzed in order to pinpoint the issues and then targeted supports put in place," the report from the public school division says.

The report from the Catholic school division notes that while achievement levels continue to be lower than provincial numbers, there has been some improvement since the previous year.

Less than half of Fort McMurray public school students who wrote the Mathematics 30-1 exam earned more than 50 percent, compared to 71 per cent of Alberta students.

And only about a quarter of Fort McMurray public school students earned the acceptable standard on the Mathematics 30-2 exam, compared to 71 per cent of Alberta students.

"It is clear that numeracy and math skills are significantly weaker than is acceptable," the report from the public school division says.

Results for both math courses have declined over the last five years.

Students in Fort McMurray public schools performed well on the French Language Arts 30-1 exam, but the percentages of students achieving acceptable scores were below the provincial numbers for other exams.

The Catholic school division's report says the results on the Science 30 and French Language Arts 30 exams were "of particular concern," requiring "a more focused and immediate strategy."

Less than half of students in that division earned an acceptable score on the French Language Arts 30 diploma exam, compared to 93 per cent of Alberta students. And 55 per cent of students earned the acceptable standard on the Science 30 exam, compared to 79 per cent of Alberta students.

Province-wide, the number of students earning the acceptable standard on diploma exams rose from 75 per cent in 2021-22 to 80 per cent in the last school year.

More than 80 per cent of students in Edmonton and Calgary's public and Catholic divisions earned the acceptable standard on diploma exams.

Fire, flood, pandemic

Both Fort McMurray divisions' reports say the 2016 wildfire, the 2020 flood and the COVID-19 pandemic have affected students.

Dr. Vincent Agyapong, a psychiatry professor and department head at Dalhousie University, said experiencing multiple traumatic events can have a cumulative effect on the mental health of students, teachers and parents.

Agyapong, who is also a clinical professor at the University of Alberta, used to work in Fort McMurray. He was among the more than 90,000 people who fled the community during the wildfire in 2016 but permanently moved away before the flood caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damage in 2020.

Dr. Vincent Agyapong says experiencing multiple disasters has been found to have a negative cumulative effect on Fort McMurray residents' mental health. (Madeleine Cummings/CBC)

In an article published last year in the European Journal of Psychotraumatology, Agyapong and his colleagues found that Fort McMurray residents who had experienced COVID-19, flooding and wildfire trauma were 18 times more likely to have symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder and more than 11 times likely to have PTSD, compared to survey respondents who had experienced only pandemic-related trauma.

"You have an atmosphere in Fort McMurray that's not very conducive for studies, which may be reflected in the results," he said.

Tutors see surge in demand

Two longtime tutors in Fort McMurray told CBC News they are seeing an unprecedented surge in demand for their services.

"I've never, ever been as busy as I am now," said Cecil Dickason, who started working on Saturdays for the first time to accommodate more high school students needing help.

He said the increase began more than a year ago and intensified in the last six months.

There's so much demand, his business, The Math Academy, can't currently accept new students.

Cecil Dickason says his tutoring business is busier than ever. (Submitted by Cecil Dickason)

Trudie Tulk of Trudie Tulk Tutorials said she usually gets two or three calls a week but is now fielding that number per day. She too has had to turn people away since her fall schedule filled up earlier than usual, in the first week of September.

"It's heartbreaking because parents are calling you, their kids are suffering, and I'd love to be able to help, but there's only so many hours that I have in the day to help," she said.

Tulk said she has noticed an increase in anxiety among students and parents — perhaps linked to the recent disasters.

"There's a pervasive fear of threat here and we're trying to heal," she said.

Both tutors said there is likely more to the story — students spending more time at jobs, for example, or less interested in pursuing university programs.

'We can improve these results'

Officials from Fort McMurray Catholic Schools were not available for an interview on Tuesday.

Linda Mywaart, board chair of Fort McMurray Public Schools, told CBC News diploma exams don't fully capture students' knowledge.

The province's website acknowledges the timed tests don't measure some learning outcomes well.

Both divisions' students results on provincial achievement tests, which are given to students in grades six and nine, were similar to province-wide results.

Mywaart said the division has identified literacy and numeracy as its biggest areas of improvement, with full-time coordinators assigned to each area and available to all schools.

She said one challenge in the community is the lack of access to mental health services.

"Having to come to Edmonton for services, services that may not be accessible for weeks or sometimes even months, certainly provide some extra layer of challenge," Mywaart said.

She said the division's staff, most of whom have also lived through the region's recent disasters, are rising to the challenge of helping students catch up.

"We are optimistic that we can improve these results," she said.