Back-to-school plan will be released early next week, Ford says
Posted July 28, 2021 1:09 pm.
Last Updated July 28, 2021 1:52 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Premier Doug Ford says Ontario’s back-to-school plan will be announced early next week.
Ford shared the news today during a visit to Thunder Bay, Ont., where he met with local leaders to discuss the ongoing wildfires that have forced thousands from their homes.
The Premier says the comprehensive back-to-school plan will include making sure schools have proper ventilation.
“We’re making sure that we increase the protocols, we’re making sure the two million kids going back to school are going to be safe,” he said on Wednesday.
“As well as the teachers from changing everything from the filters to making sure they have proper ventilation in the schools.”
That was one of the recommendations of the province’s advisory group of science experts, who also called for schools to remain open in all but the most catastrophic scenarios.
In late June, Education Minister Stephen Lecce reaffirmed his commitment to a full return to in-person learning, saying, “our government is firmly committed to getting all children back to class, full-time, in-person, this September where they belong.”
Lecce says he’s been working with Ontario health officials for months on the 2021-22 school year plan.
“He [Dr. Kieran Moore] and I both reaffirmed to create a more normal experience, stable for the kids, staying in class,” said Lecce.
Ontario has had the longest interruption to in-person classes in Canada.
The province’s chief medical officer of health has said that he wants a conservative, safe opening of schools and that the plan has a significant amount of prevention factored in.
Moore said Tuesday that while the province is in “the last leg of the race” against COVID-19, the government is doing all it can to help overcome vaccine hesitancy in roughly 1.8 million people – including more than 300,000 students.
Moore says that despite steady progress in daily vaccinations, two in 10 eligible Ontarians are still without a first dose. He adds that the risk of someone without any protection contracting COVID-19 is 6.4 times higher than those with at least one dose.
Opposition leader Andrea Horwath has openly criticized the Ford government’s handling of a return to school for students tweeting on Wednesday that “students don’t need Doug Ford to drive them to school.”
“They need Ford and Lecce to steer schools to a #SafeSeptember2021 with a plan for small classes, better ventilation, ramped up vaccinations and mental health supports. Leave the bus driving to the professionals,” Horwath wrote.
Independent schools launch legal challenge alleging exclusion from COVID-19 funding
Three independent schools are turning to the courts after they allege the Ontario government improperly excluded them and other similar institutions from COVID-19 funding.
The schools — two in Toronto and one in Kitchener, Ont. — argue that in doling out the provincial portion of the federal Safe Return to Class Fund, the Ontario government left out some 1,500 independent institutions and the more than 150,000 children who attend them.
In an application that has not yet been tested in court, they allege the funding was withheld for “no justifiable reason” given that independent schools have been subject to the same health restrictions and closures as publicly funded ones.
The schools are asking the Divisional Court to overturn the provincial decision and order that the funding be distributed to independent schools on the same pro-rata basis as publicly funded schools.
The case is set to be heard on Aug. 9.
The Ontario government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
