Larger classrooms among sweeping changes suggested to education
Feb.15, 2012
The economist advising Queen’s Park on how to wipe out the deficit suggests sweeping changes to the sector on which Premier Dalton McGuinty has staked his reputation, arguing the province has hiked per-pupil spending by 56 per cent in the past 10 years, while enrolment has plunged… He also suggests post-secondary spending grow by no more than 1.5 per cent until 2017.
Tags: budget, disabilities, economy, tax, youth
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »
Long-promised Ontario Online Institute still far from launch
Jan 29 2012
The Ontario Online Institute was announced by the McGuinty government in the 2010 Speech from the Throne and cited again in a speech by MPP John Milloy last May… MPP Glen Murray, the new minister of training, colleges and universities, has mused publicly that one of the government’s promised three new Ontario campuses might be “online.”
Tags: budget, disabilities, participation, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Delivery System | No Comments »
Older students not eligible for Ontario tuition rebate
Jan 15 2012
That’s the fine print many failed to notice about Queen’s Park’s $430 million rebate plan that gives $1,600 back to university students and $730 back to community college students whose annual family income is below $160,000: it does not apply to students who have been out of high school for more than four years… mature students are excluded, as are part-time students, graduate students and Ontario students enrolled outside the province… Because people with children and aboriginals both tend to be older when they enter post-secondary education, both groups appear worse off under the rebate plan.
Tags: budget, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Education Policy Context | 1 Comment »
Canada Learning Bond helps low-income families
June 26, 2011
Three years after arriving in Canada from the Philippines, the new mother had no job, no income and no home of her own, but she knew something that more than 1 million Canadians like her do not: Ottawa will give low-income parents a nest egg for their child’s higher education. Because she acted on this tip from her community centre, her son Luke, who is one, will have a $500 savings bond for future tuition, to which Ottawa will add $100 a year up to a maximum of $2,000. They need not kick in any money.
Tags: poverty, tax, youth
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Native grads would soar if learning gap closed, activist says
June 13, 2011
Canada could be producing 4,200 more home-grown university grads a year and reap an estimated $401 billion more in economic productivity over 25 years if it wiped out the “tragic” learning gap between natives and the rest of Canada, says a First Nations lawyer and activist… Most reserves have waiting lists of students hoping for federal funding for tuition, which has been capped at 2 per cent each year for more than a decade, while the population — and demand for higher learning — has grown.
Tags: Native, participation, rights, standard of living
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Mental health top issue facing schools, coalition says
June 1, 2011
The new Coalition for Children and Youth Mental Health, a network of 26 province-wide groups, has asked each political party to spell out a plan for coping with what some call the “sleeping giant” in schools. “We wouldn’t let a child walk around with a broken arm, but kids with mental illness suffer just the same,” said Catherine Fife, head of the Ontario Public School Boards Association, part of the coalition. The coalition’s figures are stark. One in five children suffers from a mental health problem yet some 80 per cent get no help.
Tags: mental Health, standard of living, youth
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Province to decide on satellite campuses for colleges, universities
May 31 2011
The Ontario government no longer will let colleges and universities decide where to set up satellite campuses — as many small and remote schools have done to gain a foothold in the populous GTA. From now on, Queen’s Park alone will determine if, and where, there will be new spinoff sites. The change is a bid to avoid uneven clusters of higher learning in parts of Ontario that leave other corners starved for post-secondary programs…
Tags: budget, ideology, rights
Posted in Education Delivery System | No Comments »
Teachers pledge fresh support for northern reading camps
August 18, 2010
They are the most at-risk children in Canada, in more danger of dying young and living poor than any of their peers. Aboriginal children born into the 49 fly-in reserves that dot the vast woodlands of northern Ontario have long been more likely to drop out of school, remain illiterate and attempt suicide than young people anywhere else in the province. They are among the young Canadians with the least hope. Yet a five-year push on literacy in these remote reserves is starting to make a difference…
Tags: philanthropy, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Education Debates | 1 Comment »
Teachers’ union calls for two-year testing freeze
August 16, 2010
The teachers’ union has long opposed province-wide testing, arguing it takes away precious teaching time, and has produced a 10-minute video of teachers criticizing the tests, which it hopes teachers will show at home and school meetings. Dombrowsky, who is slated to address the teachers Tuesday morning, noted Ontario already changed the test in 2005 to address teachers’ concerns, cutting the testing time in half and holding the test later in the school year.
Tags: budget
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »
Ontario unveils full-day kindergarten curriculum
April 14, 2010
The program, which will be tweaked next year if problems arise, will ultimately replace the current kindergarten curriculum when full-day learning is fully rolled out in 2015. It introduces the basics of language, math, science, arts, physical activity and personal development — all through activity rooted in play.
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »
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