Ontario education consultations draw 72,000 submissions

TheStar.com
January 2, 2019
Kristin Rushowy

The province’s education consultations drew 72,000 submissions--online and via call-in town halls--and the government plans to release an update on the results in the next few months.

“I am encouraged by the level and quality of engagement in these consultations,” Education Minister Lisa Thompson said in a statement released Monday.

Education Minister Lisa Thompson in a statement Monday thanked those who participated in the consultations for their “thoughtful and meaningful feedback.”

“I want to sincerely thank the people of Ontario who provided such thoughtful and meaningful feedback.”

The government called the consultations the “largest public consultation on education in the province’s history,” asking parents and community members about everything from STEM to sex-ed to the skilled trades.

The input will “help inform policy and program decisions” in the future in those areas, and others, it says.

Premier Doug Ford had promised, during the election campaign, that he would scrap the modernized 2015 sex-ed curriculum, to appease social conservatives and others who felt they weren’t properly consulted on the changes.

That morphed into a broader consultation that looked at not only the new health curriculum--which the government set aside last fall, leaving schools to use a version of the 1998 lessons--but also science, math, cellphones in schools and creating a parents’ bill of rights.

Annie Kidder, of research and advocacy group People for Education, said 72,000 is an “impressive number” and she herself participated in one of the 27 telephone town halls.

“I thought there was a wonderful breadth of opinion about all of the subjects,” she said. “It was really well-facilitated and it was an interesting way to build a conversation about public education.

“That part is really hopeful--that so many people were engaged in the discussion.”

However, she added, “the proof will be in the pudding--we’ll see what comes next.”

“What’s going to be interesting is the next steps” she said, adding that budget decisions come in February “and there’s always an intersection between policy and finance.

“What we hope is that the policies are driving the finances rather than the other way around.”

Toronto District School Board trustee Shelley Laskin took to Twitter on Monday to say: “And now we wait ... anxious to understand how and when feedback will be available to the public and how the responses will be summarized and weighted to ensure accountability in the recommendations.”

Kidder said the Ford government’s actions must be balanced “between what the general public wants and thinks, and what the evidence says.”

“It is really important that in public education, in particular ... that we base decisions based on the evidence of what works and what makes a difference, and what kids are going to need in the future.”

The updated sex-ed curriculum was built around the advice and expertise of experts in the field, and Kidder wonders if changes there will focus around its implementation, rather than the material itself.

The Canadian Press reported last month that of the first 1,600 submissions to the online surveys, almost all supported the modern sex-ed curriculum and wanted it to return to Ontario’s elementary classrooms. (High school students have continued to learn the updated lessons.)

In response, Ford had mused that “certain groups” had overtaken the consultations in the early days, though he did not provide specifics.

Kidder, however, said that from her “very small experience, I didn’t feel any special interest groups were there--there was a wide range of opinions” in the call-in town hall, she added.

“I definitely didn’t feel like it was taken over by anybody.”

Thompson has said she will consider releasing all submissions.

Ontario’s modernized sex-ed curriculum was created after years of work with health experts, educators, parents, as well as dozens of professionals at hospitals across Ontario, including Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children.

The government faces several legal and human rights challenges over reverting to the old curriculum, especially in regards to LGBT issues that were not mentioned in the 1998 lessons.