News
The NWT’s switch to the BC curriculum: what families need to know for 2026–27
What changed and when, why the territory made the move, and what it means for courses and graduation.
Correction, October 30, 2026 We completed the phase-in timeline from the territory’s own page, and removed a quotation we couldn’t trace to a government source. MapleMind’s Northwest Territories choice, which this post said was coming, is in the app. We also corrected the Grade 12 math and English course names, which rules last year’s graduates finished under, and what the transcript shows from the graduation assessments.
Contents
If your child goes to school in Yellowknife, Inuvik, Hay River or any NWT community, the curriculum behind their classes has changed. For decades the territory taught an adapted version of Alberta’s program. It now teaches British Columbia’s. Here is what changed, when, why, and what it means for courses and graduation.
What changed, and when
The Northwest Territories is moving its whole school system, junior kindergarten to Grade 12, from Alberta’s curriculum to the one used in British Columbia, adapted for the NWT. The territory’s Department of Education, Culture and Employment (ECE) calls it the JK-12 Curriculum Renewal, and has been phasing it in since 2023–24.
A curriculum is the set of learning outcomes expected at each grade: what a Grade 4 student should understand about fractions, what a Grade 11 science course covers. The NWT doesn’t write a full program of its own. For decades it adapted Alberta’s; now it adapts BC’s.
The year that matters most is 2026–27: it’s the first year every grade, from junior kindergarten to Grade 12, learns from BC’s curriculum. A few grades are still on the draft version that year, and they move to the final version in 2027–28.
The phased timeline
The territory brought grades onto the new curriculum in stages, a few grades at a time. Here is the phase-in as ECE publishes it.
| School year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 2023–24 | Grades 4 to 6 and Grade 9 try the draft BC curriculum |
| 2024–25 | Grades 4 to 6 use the draft in all subjects. Grade 9, in the Grades 9 to 12 group, uses the final version, and the Grades 7 to 9 group tries the draft. Grade 10 starts the draft, the first class under the new graduation requirements |
| 2025–26 | Grades 1 to 3 try the draft. Grades 4 to 6 and Grade 10 move to the final version. Grades 7 to 9 and Grade 11 use the draft. The last Alberta Grade 12 diploma exams are written in June 2026 |
| 2026–27 | Junior kindergarten, kindergarten, Grades 1 to 3 and Grade 12 use the draft. Grades 7 to 9 and Grade 11 move to the final version |
| 2027–28 | Junior kindergarten, kindergarten, Grades 1 to 3 and Grade 12 move to the final version |
Reading it as a parent: whatever grade your child is in for 2026–27, they’re on BC’s curriculum. If an older child graduated in 2024, 2025 or 2026, they finished under the Alberta-based program and its diploma exams. The class of 2027 is the first to graduate under the new requirements.
Why the NWT switched
The territory compared five jurisdictions’ curricula and chose BC’s. Two reasons stand out in what the government said at the time.
How Indigenous knowledge is built in. The territory said that “Indigenous worldviews, knowledge, and perspectives are integrated in all of BC’s curricula in a meaningful and intentional way”. Its consultation report found BC’s curriculum “consistently the strongest of the five jurisdictions examined” on that count, Cabin Radio reported. In a territory where many students are Dene, Inuvialuit and Métis, that mattered. The NWT had also been “unnerved by Alberta’s recently updated curriculum, a document panned by experts”, as Cabin Radio reported in 2021.
A design built on skills. Education Minister RJ Simpson said BC’s curriculum “aims to personalize learning, making it more student-centred and flexible”. It’s organized around what students learn to do over time, not only facts to memorize.
There was a precedent next door: Yukon already used an adapted version of BC’s curriculum. The NWT is doing the same thing, with BC’s learning standards underneath and its own northern and Indigenous content alongside.
What it means for students and parents
Most of this change happens in what teachers plan toward. A few parts are visible to families.
Graduation requirements
This is the biggest concrete change, and it affects high school students most. To earn an NWT diploma, students now complete at least 80 credits and write the graduation assessments in literacy and numeracy. Courses moved from Alberta’s five-credit structure to BC’s four-credit one. The required courses are Northern Studies 11, Language Arts 10, 11 and 12, math, science and social studies at Grade 10 and at Grade 11 or 12, Physical and Health Education 10, an arts or applied design, skills and technologies course, and two career education courses. At least 16 of the 80 credits must be at Grade 12.
Alberta’s Grade 12 diploma exams, which counted for 30% of the final mark in courses like math, English and the sciences, are gone: the last ones were written in June 2026. There are three graduation assessments: Grade 10 literacy, Grade 10 numeracy and Grade 12 literacy. Students must write all three but don’t have to pass them to graduate, and they don’t count toward any course mark. They’re scored on a proficiency scale. The transcript shows the best result on the Grade 10 numeracy and Grade 12 literacy assessments. For Grade 10 literacy, it shows only that it was written.
Course names are changing
The Alberta streams families knew, the -1, -2 and -3 courses, are replaced by BC’s course names. In the NWT, BC’s courses named for First Peoples are called Indigenous Peoples courses, except BC First Peoples 12. The point isn’t to memorize them, just to recognize them on a timetable.
| Subject | Alberta’s names | The names now |
|---|---|---|
| Math, Grade 10 | Math 10C, Math 10-3 | Foundations of Mathematics and Pre-calculus 10; Workplace Mathematics 10 |
| Math, Grades 11 and 12 | Math 20-1 and 30-1, 20-2 and 30-2, 20-3 and 30-3 | Pre-calculus 11 and 12; Foundations of Mathematics 11 and 12; Workplace Mathematics 11; Apprenticeship Mathematics 12 |
| Sciences, Grades 11 and 12 | Biology 20 and 30, Chemistry 20 and 30, Physics 20 and 30 | Life Sciences 11, Anatomy and Physiology 12, Chemistry 11 and 12, Physics 11 and 12 |
| English, Grade 12 | English 30-1, English 30-2 | English Studies 12; English Indigenous Peoples 12 (English First Peoples 12 in BC) |
| Social studies, Grades 11 and 12 | Social Studies 30-1, 30-2 | Explorations in Social Studies 11; BC First Peoples 12; other Grade 12 courses |
The closest successor to Math 30-1 is the Pre-calculus path, through Pre-calculus 11 and Pre-calculus 12.
Transcripts and university
Students now graduate under NWT requirements built on BC’s program, with BC course names and credits. Universities across Canada already admit students from British Columbia and Yukon on these courses every year. As always, check the requirements of each program your child applies to, since they vary by school and faculty.
Understanding the BC curriculum
Since this is now the curriculum NWT classrooms run on, it helps to see how it’s put together. BC built every subject at every grade on one model, which it calls Know-Do-Understand.
| Part | What it means |
|---|---|
| Big Ideas (Understand) | The key ideas that stay with a student long after the unit ends: why it matters |
| Curricular Competencies (Do) | The skills a student practises: reasoning, investigating, communicating, analyzing |
| Content (Know) | The topics and facts at each grade: the what |
From kindergarten to Grade 9, the curriculum is set out by subject at each grade. From Grade 10, it’s a choice of named courses within each subject, which is where the new course names come from, and where the graduation years begin.
In mathematics, Grade 10 is Foundations of Mathematics and Pre-calculus 10 or Workplace Mathematics 10. From Grade 11 the paths split: Pre-calculus, for math-heavy programs like engineering and the sciences; Foundations of Mathematics, for many arts and social science programs; and Workplace Mathematics 11 then Apprenticeship Mathematics 12, applied and trades-focused.
BC’s own diploma, the Dogwood, asks for at least 80 credits and the literacy and numeracy assessments too. The NWT’s requirements are built on the same frame, with the territory’s own courses added.
Where MapleMind fits
MapleMind follows BC’s curriculum for NWT students: choose the Northwest Territories in the app, and it gives you the BC courses your child takes, from Grade 1 math to the senior math, science and English courses. It’s free in any browser, with 4 activities and 30 tutor messages a day.
Sources
- Government of the Northwest Territories, Education, Culture and Employment, JK-12 Curriculum Renewal (opens in a new tab). Checked October 30, 2026.
- Government of the Northwest Territories, Education, Culture and Employment, Graduation Requirements (opens in a new tab). Checked October 30, 2026.
- Government of the Northwest Territories, GNWT releases new graduation requirements for renewed JK-12 curriculum (opens in a new tab), February 27, 2023. Checked October 30, 2026.
- Government of the Northwest Territories, Education, Culture and Employment, NWT Graduation Program Implementation Guide (opens in a new tab), updated January 2026. Checked October 30, 2026.
- Cabin Radio, NWT partners with BC for new JK-12 school curriculum (opens in a new tab), December 16, 2021. Checked October 30, 2026.
- Government of British Columbia, Graduation requirements (opens in a new tab). Checked October 30, 2026.
- Government of British Columbia, Curriculum overview (opens in a new tab). Checked October 30, 2026.
Spotted a mistake? Tell us. How we check our facts
