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Ontario's Government on Education

Progressive Conservative Party

The Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario committed to getting the Ontario school system back to the basics by “teach[ing] students the fundamentals of mathematics and move toward improving math scores among Ontario’s students. This will include making mathematics mandatory in Ontario’s teachers college programs.” Additionally, they pledged to “reform the current, failing EQAO testing model, and instead introduce a standardized testing model that more directly tests fundamental math skills.” The EQAO is the Education Quality and Accountability Office; as a Crown agency, it ensures an equal secondary and primary school experience for students across the province. It also administers a secondary school standardized provincial-wide exam.

They also claim to be working on “restor[ing] Ontario’s previous sex-ed curriculum until we can install a new one that is age-appropriate and based on real consultation with parents.” The largest section of their education platform focuses on “protecting free speech”. They promise to “expand the mandate for the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) to include a complaints and investigations process to evaluate violations of free speech.”

New Democratic Party

The New Democratic Party of Ontario promises “a new funding formula [that] will address violence in classrooms, and will mean boards, teachers, and education workers have the resources they need to ensure the well-being and safety of all learners, and all educators.” They also pledged to “curb class sizes" and “base special education funding on actual needs, not overall populations, with timely needs assessments.” As part of curbing classroom size, they vowed to “cap kindergarten classrooms at 26 children" and "end [the] Kindergarten / Grade 1 split classrooms.”

With regard to post-secondary education, the New Democratic Party promises to “address affordability head-on with a game-changing initiative: provincial loans for all new postsecondary students will become grants.” Finally, they promise to “launch a faculty renewal strategy to allow contract educators to become full-time professors and instructors, and invest in more tenure-track faculty positions.”

Liberal Party

The Liberal Party of Ontario pledged to “invest $625 million to boost education funding as well as an additional $300 million to improve special education programs.” Additionally, they promise to “provide free full-day daycare for preschoolers starting in 2020 — which would cost $2.2 billion”. They also promise to “offer grants to lower-income students to cover their tuition”. Finally, they promise to “fund high school apprenticeship programs to the tune of $410 million”.

Green Party

The Green Party of Ontario is committed to “keep class sizes low by restricting them to [a maximum of] 22 students from grades 4 to 8” as well as “get rid of standardized testing”. Additionally, they promise to “expand funding for high schools in low-income areas” and “provide interest-free loans for post-secondary education to students in need”. Finally, they promise to “boost funding for adult education and learning” as well as “eventually guarantee fully public tuition for all Ontario residents”.

What Have They Accomplished?

Progressive Conservative Party

During the 2018 Ontario provincial election, the Progressive Conservative Party promised to focus on “improving math scores among Ontario students” by teaching students the “fundamentals of mathematics”. In March of 2019, the Ontario government announced a four-year math strategy to “ensure students have a strong understanding of math fundamentals and how to apply them”. In June of 2020, Premier Doug Ford publicly said that "starting in September, parents can look forward to a math curriculum that not only goes back to basics but equips our next generation of leaders and community builders with the math skills they need to build a bright future for all of us". The Ford-led Progressive Conservatives also promised to “reform the current, failing EQAO testing model, and instead introduce a standardized testing model that more directly tests fundamental math skills”. The Ford government has failed to succeed in introducing a new standardized testing model. The Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) standardized test was cancelled for the 2019-20 school year due to the pandemic, yet it has returned for the 2020-21 year for secondary school students.

Additionally, The Ontario Progressive Conservatives promised to “restore Ontario’s previous sex-ed curriculum” until there can be adequate consultation with parents and a new program can be formed. While the Progressive Conservatives did campaign on removing sex-ed from the curriculum, they instead launched a renewed program. An outline of the new health and physical education curriculum for grades 1 through 8 can be read on the Ontario website and was implemented in September of 2019. A comparison of the 2015 and 2017 sex-ed curriculums shows that they are pretty similar except for a couple of modern changes such as a shift towards online safety. Finally, the Progressive Conservatives promised to “expand the mandate for the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) to include a complaints and investigations process to evaluate violations of free speech”. In August 2018, Premier Doug Ford kept to his promise and mandated that post-secondary institutions must create free speech policies by January 1, 2019, or face undercuts.

<aside> 📍 Click here to learn about British Columbia's Government on Education.

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