Balancing Elementary Class Sizes
This year the assignment of teachers and students to classrooms is different. In previous years, a few weeks into September TDSB would review actual student enrolment in our elementary schools (compared to April’s projections) and provide schools with updated staff allocation numbers. Remember, the number of teachers allocated to the system (all schools) is directly dependent on the number of students in the TDSB; and the number of teachers allocated to a specific school is directly dependent on the number of students enrolled in that school. There were always factors, such as new or departing students, that affected how classrooms were organized. Placements were subject to change as they were based on projections. Enrolment fluctuations and staff changes might have resulted in reorganization within the school in prior to the end of September. This was always difficult, but necessary. As a system, we were generally within 1% of our projection.
The significant challenge this year has been trying to reorganize classes in the system before the start of school and actual attendance of students. As you know, we had initially staffed schools based on the registration data we collected from parents/guardians. However, to allow maximum parent choice, we allowed changes up to Friday, September 11 which has created shifts in enrolment in many schools. This year is obviously quite a challenge for assignments— especially with the introduction of the Virtual School, now that 70,000 students are now registered to attend school solely from home. To address these changes, staff is working over the weekend to allocate additional teachers to schools with class sizes significantly over the targeted class size caps.
Although the Provincial Government provided school boards with additional funds because of Covid-19, and although those funds were helpful, they were insufficient to hire enough teachers to space students 2-metres apart in all classrooms. For 2020-21, Trustees made a decision to use additional funding as well as reserve funding to enable work to be done on lowering class sizes in the elementary panel where students were returning every day.
Schools in communities identified in conjunction with Toronto Public Health as higher risk for contracting COVID-19 will have JK/SK classes with a targeted cap of 15 students, while Grade 1 to 8 classes would have targeted caps of 20. A total of 94 schools fall into this category. However in approving a deficit budget, TDSB trustees were also attempting to use limited additional funds to address large class sizes in all other schools. Please remember however, the provincial funding model for staffing was not changed. This means that class sizes in some schools will remain the same as it has been in other years, and over the targeted cap.
Staff will continue to monitor this next week as students start attending school and immediately adjust large class sizes where needed. We will not be removing teachers from schools with small class sizes at this time, as we do not want to further disrupt the system.
Please note that once enrolments have stabilized, and the first chance for transitioning from in-class to virtual and vice-a-versa has occurred, complete system reorganization will be required — likely in early October.
To be clear, we remain committed to achieving acceptable class sizes and appreciate your patience as we work through new processes.