email : Webview : Ward 19- June 22nd, Newsletter

COVID-19 Update

The Ontario government is allowing more businesses and services to open and getting more people back to work by moving the City of Toronto and Peel Region into Stage 2 on Wednesday, June 24, 2020. This decision was made in consultation with the Chief Medical Officer of Health and the local medical officers of health. It is based on positive local trends of key public health indicators, including lower transmission of COVID-19, ongoing hospital capacity, public health capacity to do rapid case and contact management, and a significant increase in testing.

A regulatory change was announced on June 15 that will mandate the reporting of data on race, income, language and household size for individuals who have tested positive for COVID-19. This will help ensure the province has a more complete picture of the outbreak. Under these proposed changes, individuals who have tested positive for COVID-19 infection will be asked additional questions about their race, income, languages spoken, and household size. Individuals can choose not to answer any or all of these questions. Individuals' privacy is protected as it is for all information currently collected on other diseases.

On June 17, the government extended all emergency orders currently in force under s.7.0.2 (4) of the Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act. This extension will be in effect until June 30, 2020, to ensure the government continues to have the necessary tools to safely and gradually reopen the province, while continuing to support frontline health care workers and protect vulnerable populations from COVID-19.

School Reopening Plans

The Minister of Education released an “Approach to Reopening Schools for the 2020-2021 School Year.” The framework requires school boards to develop reopening plans based on three scenarios, including fully online as we are now, alternate day/week attendance for students, and full-time return for all students, and to provide these plans to the Ministry of Education. It is expected that boards create local plans in conjunction with local public health units. Decisions regarding the board scenario for reopening are expected to be made in early August, and school boards will be required to communicate their plans to their school communities prior to the start of schools.

Click here for the ministry news release

Click here for the Minister of Education’s Letter to Parents

Click here for Approach to Reopening Schools for the 2020-21 School Year

Parent/Guardian Survey

As we look ahead to September, we know that school will look quite different as a result of continued efforts to slow the spread of COVID-19. We have been planning for our return considering all possibilities ensuring that student and staff well-being and safety is the priority. Much of the direction will come from both the Ministry of Education and Toronto Public Health and it is expected to be announced before the end of June, allowing us to plan and prepare throughout the summer.

We would also like to hear from you, our parent/guardian community, on your family’s experiences on remote learning, how you feel about returning to school, what concerns and expectations you may have and what supports you would like to see in place. Your feedback will help guide our conversations and ensure student voice is front and centre in our re-opening plans.

We invite you to complete this short survey by Tuesday, June 30. It should take no more than 10 minutes and is anonymous.

Thank you for your continued support.

TDSB Creates New Centre of Excellence for Black Student Achievement

Trustees with the Toronto District School Board have unanimously approved funding to create a new TDSB Centre of Excellence for Black Student Achievement. It is the first of its kind in public education in Canada. It is one of TDSB’s responses to dismantle anti-Black racism within the school board and improve both experiences and outcomes for Black students. The creation of the Centre is also responsive to the voices of the Black communities who consistently advocated for deeper systemic change from the TDSB.

Anti-Black racism is deeply entrenched in Canadian institutions, including TDSB schools, and many attempts to address it have fallen short of the expectations of students, staff, families and communities. Systemic and individual acts of anti-Black racism have become normalized and are therefore difficult to identify, address and prevent solely through policy changes.

The concept of a Centre of Excellence for Black Student Achievement was first proposed in TDSB over two years ago by the Enhancing Equity Task Force. This work involved extensive community consultation which surfaced systemic barriers that are experienced by many TDSB students and disproportionately impeded the academic success of Black students. The Task Force’s recommendations led to a number of action plans in the Board’s Multi-Year Strategic Plan focussed on specific ways to support Black students. These action plans have the goal of removing practises that stream students and decrease the educational opportunities of underserved groups of students, especially Black students.

While significant work has been done across the Board to support Black students, the report notes the “current rate of improvement in closing the achievement gap and enhancing school climate is ultimately insufficient. For Black families, present initiatives and newly developed policies and procedures need to promote faster positive change for the benefit of their children and all children to live in a more just world where everyone’s human rights are respected.”

The Centre of Excellence for Black Student Achievement will build on community voices as well as past and present efforts through a direct, multi-faceted strategy for meaningful and sustained change. The Centre will focus proactively on academic success and experiences of belonging of Black students. It will provide a more coordinated and well-resourced approach leading to systemic transformation. There will be enhanced support for impacted individuals and a forum to develop solutions that are authentic and relevant for Black students, families and staff.

The mandate of the Centre is to:

Provide support to Black students in TDSB schools to combat racism, navigate complaint processes, identify barriers to success and access appropriate resources (e.g., scholarships, networking, mentoring);
Use evidence to highlight promising practices and engage in meaningful research on topics relevant to Black students that are then integrated across schools and at the system level within the TDSB
Create professional learning in anti-Black racism and collaborate with other staff in facilitating learning in decolonization, Anti-Racism, Anti-Oppression & human rights recognizing the similarities and intersections of various forms of oppression;
Identify, develop and facilitate culturally responsive and relevant healing practices for groups of students;
Inform changes to policies and procedures so that all students may benefit from the learning and innovative practices developed by the Centre;
Establish effective mechanisms for monitoring improvement in the achievement of Black students;
Provide annual accountability reports and recommendations to the Board of Trustees and staff;
Support meaningful engagement and advocacy of caregivers for their children in TDSB schools and programs and improve communication to them about Black student success, system navigation and complaint processes; and
Engage in strategic community partnerships related to education within the annually identified approved budget for this purpose.

Quick Facts

The Centre for Excellence in Black Student Achievement would be supported by 20.5 staff positions, including a social worker, child and youth counsellor and five graduation coaches all focused on supports for Black students, improving students’ experiences and identifying the ways in which anti-Black racism is operating in TDSB and offering possible solutions to eradicate it.
Five action plans in the Multi-Year Strategic Plan titled Toward the Excellence in the Education of Black Students: Transforming Learning, Achievement and Well-Being currently support this work.

TDSB Trustees Call on Province to Incorporate Genocide Education as Compulsory Learning

On June 17th meeting of the Toronto District School Board, Trustees approved a motion calling on the Ministry of Education to incorporate Genocide education as compulsory learning. As part of the motion, Chair of the Board Robin Pilkey will make the following requests to the Minister of Education:

That the Genocide: Historical and Contemporary Implications (CHG381), Grade 11, Locally Developed Course in TDSB, be accredited as part of the Ontario Curriculum as a “university” or “mixed” course.
That genocide examples are a comprehensive study as part of the mandatory Canadian History Since World War I Grade 10 course; and,
That the province convene a working group of experts to look critically at the Ontario curriculum to ensure that students graduate with a better understanding of human rights, and how to protect those rights and take effective action if they or others experience hate, racism or others forms of discrimination and violence.

The motion, which was passed unanimously by the Board, is also supported by a number of organizations including the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, Project Abraham, National Holodomor Education Committee, Liberation75 and the Armenian National Committee.

Quick Facts

Encouraging Students to Investigate and Understand the Past to Think Critically about the Present and Future is a website that was created by the TDSB as a resource for staff and students to continue the important work of Holocaust and Genocide Education in honour of Liberation75.
As per a Board decision in June 2019, the TDSB developed the Reporting and Responding to Racism and Hate Incidents Involving or Impacting Students in Schools (PR728) procedure to set clear expectations about the processes to be followed and the Board’s responsibilities in situations where there are acts of racism and hate.
The TDSB’s Multi-Year Strategic Plan requires mandatory training for administrators in anti-oppression and anti-Black racism, as well as building capacity among educators to effectively co-lead learning in human rights, equity and anti-oppression.

Grants for Student Needs Update

The Ministry of Education released the Grants for Student Needs (GSN) memorandum, technical papers and EFIS forms (detailed grant calculation template). Also released was the Priorities and Partnership Funds (PPF) – formerly EPO grants – which are focused grants for specific initiatives.

As the GSNs were released, staff have prepared a high-level review of the memorandum below. A more detailed analysis and report will be presented at the Special FBEC meeting on June 23.

Operational Funding

Staff’s initial analysis of the overall GSN announcement did not see any significant changes other than those outlined below. Until staff have the opportunity to input our detailed data into the Ministry template, final amounts cannot be confirmed. Amounts identified in this report are estimates based on the information provided in the memorandum.

Investment for Mental Health – The Ministry announced that there will be an increase of $10M to support the continued learning and well-being of students across the Province. The TDSB portion has not been determined yet.

Investment for Technology – As part of the Ministry’s announcement, there will be an additional $15M (across the province) to support technology for students. The TDSB portion has not been determined yet.

Collective Agreements – Funding to support the negotiated collective agreements for wages and benefits, class size and supports for students will be provided.

Increase in sick leave funding – There will be additional funding to support the increase in supply costs that boards have been experiencing. The TDSB portion of that increase is forecasted to be approximately 3.4M.

Transportation – No significant funding changes are being announced for 2020-21. However, the Ministry announced a reduction in funding in 2019-20 representing the savings on reduced fuel consumption that boards experienced in 2019-20 given that school buses have not been operating since March 15. The amount of reduced funding for TDSB is $1.5M for 2019-20.

Educational Software Licensing – $2.4 million of funding (across the province) was announced to support the purchase of educational software. This funding is to offset those licenses previously provided to school boards and paid directly by the Ministry. The TDSB portion of this funding is forecasted to be approximately $112K.

At this time no additional funding for cleaning and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) has been provided in the GSN for COVID19 increased costs.

Several grants were moved into the GSN from the PPFs. These include Mental Health Workers, Experiential Learning, Curriculum and Assessment Implementation and Executive Compensation.

Priorities and Partnership Funds (PPF)

In addition to the GSN, the PPFs for next year were also announced today. Please see the complete listing of PPFs and those with announced board allocations. Where these grants were also provided in 2019-20, we have included this year’s allocation for comparison purposes.

There is no change year over year in the announced PPFs.

Capital

The Ministry also announced the capital funding for the 2020-21 school year. Renewal funding increased slightly from $47.2M to $48.5M in 2020-21. School Condition Improvement funding was increased from $244.8M in 2019-20 to $264.0M in 2020-21.

Next Steps

Over the coming weeks, staff will work to prepare a detailed financial projection for 2020-21 outlining changes in revenue and expenses. The report will also outline the impact of COVID-19 on TDSB operations in 2020-21 and include an update the financial projection for 2019-20. This report will come to the Special FBEC on July 7.

Ontario Public Student Trustee Scholarship

OPSBA and OSTA-AECO announced the winners of the first ever Ontario Public Student Trustee Scholarship. Two scholarships in the amount of $500 each have been awarded to Anumita Jain, a Grade 12 student at Vincent Massey SS in Windsor from the Greater Essex County District School Board , and Prasith Wijeweera, a Grade 12 student at Bell HS in the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board, respectively. The intent of this scholarship is to recognize outstanding achievement and provide financial support to a graduating public board student trustee to assist with their post-secondary education plans, whether they choose to attend university or college or start an apprenticeship.

Webinars for TDSB Families

TDSB families are invited to join us for a series of engaging and informative conversations on topics we heard you want to learn more about.

Hear from leading experts and participate in question and answer sessions online.

These three conversations are jointly hosted by the TDSB's Parent and Community Engagement Office and PIAC.

Mental Health, Well-Being and Routines in the Early Years

Monday, June 22, 6:30-8 p.m.

Mental Health, Well-Being and Routines in Adolescents and Teens

Wednesday, June 24, 6:30-8 p.m.

Talking Race With Your Children

Friday, June 26, 6:30-8 p.m.

Registration and more information: https://www.tdsb.on.ca/News/Article-Details/ArtMID/474/ArticleID/1474/Join-the-Conversation-on-Well-Being-Routines-and-Talking-Race-with-Your-Children

Student Device

If you still require a device for your child(ren) please contact me directly at Zakir.Patel@tdsb.on.ca and I will work with your Principals and Superintendents to acquire a device.

Manage your preferences | Opt out using TrueRemove®
Got this as a forward? Sign up to receive our future emails.
View this email online.

5050 Yonge St.
Toronto, Ontario | M2N 5N8 CA

This email was sent to .
To continue receiving our emails, add us to your address book.

Trustee Update