Specialized Workers at Edmonton Public Schools Join CUPE

EDMONTON, Alberta — A group of 285 employees of Edmonton Public School District voted to join the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 3550.

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In an Alberta Labour Board vote last week, the group of employees voted 73.4% to join the union. They will join other non-teaching employees at the district as part of CUPE.

The new CUPE members include specialized support workers in areas of diversity, including adaptive physical education, assistive technology, audiology, deaf or hard of hearing, education behaviour, English as another language, intercultural, mental health, occupational therapy, physical therapy, reading, sexual orientation and gender identity, speech-language pathology, psychology, school family liaison, social work, vision and braille.

CUPE Alberta President Rory Gill said the workers joined the union after efforts to collaborate with the employer were not solving their issues. Gill said the workers wanted to unionize to give them a collective voice at the table regarding workplace issues.

“As part of the largest union in Canada, these workers will have all the resources and strength CUPE has to offer,” said Gill.

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