Doug Ford is Looking for Ideas to Revamp Ontario’s Education System
Published October 19, 2018 at 10:22 pm
During the provincial election, Premier Doug Ford promised that he would do more consultation with parents on contentious issues such as Ontario’s sex ed curriculum.
But it seems the province is going one step further, as the premier said in this video that a bigger consultation process would be for the entire education system.
Our government promised to introduce the largest-ever education consultation in Ontario’s history, and that’s exactly what we’re doing. Parents: we want to hear from you! Visit https://t.co/lTBdKtwhXc and have your voice heard. #onpoli pic.twitter.com/iEYmFYTuN6
— Doug Ford (@fordnation) October 19, 2018
Ford announced that a new digital survey would be launched to solicit feedback from parents on what they wanted to see in their schools. “The Liberals tried to freeze parents out; we believe parents must be heard,” the premier said.
The feedback from the online consultations will shape the province’s decisions in these following areas:
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Improving student performance in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM)
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Preparing students with needed job skills, such as skilled trades and coding
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Improving provincial standardized testing
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Ensuring students graduate with important life skills, including financial literacy
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Managing the use of technology in classrooms, such as cell phones
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Building a new age-appropriate Health and Physical Education curriculum that includes subjects like mental health, sexual health education and the legalization of cannabis
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Developing the first-ever Parents’ Bill of Rights
If you are interested in participating in this survey, there are three ways to do so:
Share your views on all or some of the 7 key consultation areas that are outlined above:
Use our private and confidential online submission form, or email your written submission to [email protected] and:
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include your name or the name of your organization
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add “provincial consultations” as the subject
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attach your submission as a PDF or Word document
You can also send your feedback through this online survey, or…
Participate through a telephone town hall, which you can look for in your region here. The one for Peel and Halton takes place on Friday, October 26 at 12:00 p.m to 1:30 p.m.
At the end of the day, when you hear that the government wants to do an online consultation, it’s normal for some to be skeptical of the process, wondering if the end result really reflects what you submitted as feedback.
But considering that not everyone has an unanimous opinion on a topic as diverse as the future of the entire education system, it will be interesting to see what the end result for the people will be in Ford’s consultation process.
The deadline for the consultation period ends on December 15, 2018.
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