Boards ask province to lift ban on school closings

Thestar.com
Feb. 20, 2020
Kristin Rushowy and Isabel Teotonio

Ontario’s education minister says the ban on school closings won’t last forever, as boards clamour for the province to lift a three-year-old moratorium so they can deal with changing enrolments as well as tight budgets.

And as the province moves to higher class sizes, with fewer teachers and course options for teens, it makes more sense to consolidate and have larger secondary schools where more classes can be offered, said the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association.

School closing processes have “been under review for quite some time and the delay is not helpful to school boards,” said association president Cathy Abraham. “Anything we can do to help the minister with that review, we will. We are looking forward to (the moratorium) being lifted.”

Education Minister Stephen Lecce said Wednesday that “the government is committed to maintaining the moratorium until we have revised the (review) guidelines and ensuring the economic impacts of school closures are more robustly represented in that formula and those guidelines.”

Speaking to reporters at Queen’s Park, he said “I understand that the moratorium cannot exist in perpetuity. But we made a commitment -- after the largest school closure policy in the history of Ontario under the former Liberal government ... we said we’ve got to get this right.”

In June 2017, after reports of hundreds of Ontario schools on the chopping block, the former Liberal government put the school closing ban in place saying boards needed better guidelines for consultations and needed to take the impact on the community, as well as student well-being, into account when shuttering buildings.

At present, there are too few students for the city's 111 high schools? with enrolment around 73,000, schools are operating on average at about 78 per cent capacity.

Lecce said he has met with mayors, reeves and wardens from across Ontario and is listening to their input.

“I will be making a determination in due course,” he said, although he did not provide a specific timeline.

The school boards’ association, in its pre-budget submission, said that “with regard to reducing red tape, we suggest the ministry consider the following: Lift the moratorium on school closures and release the revised Pupil Accommodation Review Guidelines (PARG). This will allow school boards to make prudent programming and financial decisions.”

Abraham said it’s important people know that accommodation reviews aren’t always about school closings.

“There may be a family of schools with enrolment pressures” that boards need to deal with “like a puzzle,” she said.

“Boards need to look at the entire picture and have a plan,” Abraham added. “It’s difficult under a moratorium to even have accommodation review conversations.”

She said all boards grappled with “difficult budget decisions” last year, and “we are trying do more with less.”

And with even larger classes on the way -- the province’s initial plan to get to an average of 28 students is still officially on the books and what boards are working to get closer to as they plan for next year -- that means fewer teachers.

Bigger schools need more teachers so more courses can be offered, she added.

While school closings tend to cause controversy and hurt feelings, “I think we can work with our communities to come up with good solutions for our schools,” Abraham said. “What I am more worried about is not being able to do that. The longer it takes, the bigger the problem gets.”

The Toronto District School Board is currently conducting a review of secondary schools and is looking to merge, move or close a number of them.

The city’s 111 public high schools serve about 73,000 students, and on average schools operate at about 78-per-cent capacity. Only 18 schools are at 90- to 110-per-cent capacity. One-quarter of secondary schools are half-empty.

The 20,000 unused spaces equal 20 schools, based on the ideal size of about 1,000 students.

John Malloy, education director for the Toronto District School Board, says the board has spoken with the province about lifting the moratorium on school closures.

The ultimate vision, according to a board report, is “fewer but stronger schools that provide greater access, better options and rich pathways as close to home as possible.”

“We have many high schools that students want to go to, so they would be full or oversubscribed, and we have other high schools, that I would suggest are very strong, but not as many students wish to apply to them,” said TDSB director John Malloy.
“That sets up another dynamic of students having access to courses and programs in the larger schools and students in the smaller schools may be struggling to gain that same access.”

Malloy says the board has spoken with the province about lifting the moratorium, explaining that “at some time down the road we will need to engage in consolidation and closures.”

The board’s policy of Optional Attendance that allows students to apply outside their community, is also under review. It means just over half of students attend their local school, while the rest opt to go to a school that’s larger with more options, offers specialized programming or has a better reputation.

Joanne Dicaire, chair of the parent council at Rosedale Heights School of the Arts in Toronto, is concerned the board’s secondary review will result in specialized schools being “at great risk.”

“It is a road map to cutting back,” said Dicaire, whose daughter is in Grade 12. “If the agenda is to have local schools across the city, offering a hint of some of those programs within that school structure, then that’s the very essence of eliminating specialized schools.”