Work one on one with the students who need the most help. One year of college gets you into a school.
Click through it
Pay, the path, pros and cons and the facts on one printable page. Counsellors: send it to a student from your own email in one click.
Programs in the fields this career usually comes through. Each has its own page: what it takes to get in, the courses you need and what it costs.
The median pay is about $52,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $38,000 at the lower end to about $67,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
1 to 2 years after high school, on the usual route.
$3,700 to $12,500 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
No. There is no licence to hold, though many employers still ask for training or a certificate.
Moderate demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$52,000
Lower end
$38,000
Upper end
$67,000
Job Bank's national median is $25.01 an hour, about $52,000 a year at full-time hours. Read that carefully: many positions are 10 months a year and some are only 6 hours a day, so what actually lands in your bank account is often less. Ask how many hours and how many months before you accept an offer.
$32 an hour in New Brunswick
The highest provincial median on Job Bank, about $67,000 a year at 40 hours a week
Nova Scotia is lowest at $21 an hour and Ontario is $26. The Northwest Territories and Nunavut are higher still at $36. Public boards pay on a union grid, so the rate is posted and you move up it every year.
10 months
Most school-board positions run September to June
Some assistants collect Employment Insurance (EI) over the summer, some work camps, and some spread their pay over 12 months. Year-round board jobs exist but they are the exception.
Roughly, all in
$3,700 to $12,500
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is a one year college certificate plus a police record check for working with vulnerable people. The high end is a two year college diploma plus first aid, CPR and crisis response training paid for up front. Employers often pay for the first aid and crisis training once you are hired, so that part can be zero to you. This is one of the cheapest routes into a school and most people finish with very little debt.
This is one of the cheapest routes into a school. Most people finish with very little debt.
Defined-benefit pension
School-board staff join the same public pension plans teachers do in most provinces.
Health and dental through the union
School holidays
March break, winter break and summer are off, paid or not depending on your contract.
Seniority
Once you are on a board's list, you get first pick of postings as you build years.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Short college program, then apply to school boards. No licence, no exam.
High school diploma
Grade 12
Grade 12 English. Volunteer with kids or with people who have disabilities: it is what boards look at.
College program
1 to 2 years
A 1-year certificate or 2-year diploma. Names vary: Educational Support, Educational Assistant, Teacher Assistant, Special Needs. All include placements in real classrooms.
Police record check and first aid
Weeks
Every board requires a vulnerable sector check before you set foot in a school.
Get on the supply list
Months to 2 years
Almost everyone starts as a casual or supply assistant, called in day by day. This is the waiting part.
Permanent posting
Varies by board
A named position at one school with set hours. Seniority decides who gets it.
English
You will read plans and write daily notes on student progress.
Family studies or social sciences
Child development and psychology come up constantly.
Physical education
Lifting, transfers and active supervision are part of the job.
Any co-op placement in a school
The single best thing you can do before college.
There is no licence and no college you must join. Each school board sets its own hiring requirements, and almost all of them ask for a one or two year college credential plus a vulnerable sector police check. The job title changes across the country: educational assistant in Ontario, education assistant in BC (British Columbia), teacher assistant or student support worker elsewhere. Because it is not regulated, your credential moves between provinces easily, but you start at the bottom of a new board's seniority list every time you move.
Quebec schools split this work into two jobs: an attendant who helps students with disabilities day to day, and a special education technician, who needs a 3 year college diploma.
Finish Secondary V
Age 16 or 17
A high school diploma is enough for préposé aux élèves handicapés (attendant for students with disabilities). You help with learning, moving around, hygiene and safety.
Or a DEP (Diploma of Vocational Studies)
Optional
Some school boards also accept the DEP in Assistance à la personne en établissement de santé (health care assistance) for attendant jobs.
Special Education Techniques DEC (Diploma of College Studies) (351.A1)
3 years
3 years, formerly called Special Care Counselling, with 3 supervised internships. It leads to special education technician jobs. In English at Vanier College.
Other accepted routes
Varies
Boards also accept another DEC plus an AEC (Attestation of College Studies) in special education, or 30 university credits in special education or psychoeducation added to a DEC.
Apply to a school board
Varies
Students in year 2 or 3 of the DEC can take temporary replacements. Some boards test your French when you apply.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Applied behaviour analysis training
Known as ABA (applied behaviour analysis). Boards want assistants who can run behaviour programs for autistic students.
American Sign Language
Deaf and hard of hearing programs hire for it directly.
Crisis prevention and de-escalation certification
Required for many behaviour-focused placements.
Personal support worker training
Useful for students with complex medical or physical needs, and it opens health jobs too.
Driver's licence
Supply work means driving to a different school most mornings.
A second language
Especially French, or a language common in your board's community.
Camp or coaching experience
Shows you can hold a group of kids together.
Patience you can prove
Interviews are full of scenario questions about a student having a hard day.
Plenty of assistants stay for a whole career, and that is a real choice. Others use the job as a paid look inside a school before committing: it is a common route into a teaching degree, into child and youth work, or into developmental services. Some move into specialized board roles like behaviour support, or into the job coach and community support side outside schools.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Arrive before the bell and check in with the teacher. Then you are beside one student, or a few, for most of the day: keeping them on task, rewording the lesson, running a reading or math program, helping with toileting or feeding if that is the need. Recess and lunch are supervision, not a break. You write down what happened, and when a student has a hard day you are the one who manages it and the one who gets kicked or bitten sometimes.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Every identified student in Ontario gets an Individual Education Plan, a written document listing their accommodations, goals and supports. Assistants deliver most of what is written in it, but a teacher signs it.
Educational assistant, education assistant, teacher assistant, teaching assistant, student support worker. Same work, different province or board. Search all of them when you look for postings.
Job Bank counted about 105,300 educational assistants in Canada in 2023, and 37% were 50 or older. It expects a moderate risk of a shortage through 2033.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Early years and support first, then the rest of the field. See every career in education.
Last checked October 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in Canadian dollars, based on Government of Canada Job Bank wage data and published salary grids. They vary by province, employer and experience. Tuition is for domestic students. How every figure on this site is sourced and checked.
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