The Province is the government body responsible for providing all education funding in Ontario. Therefore, it is obvious that for School Boards to ensure safe, well-maintained school buildings, they would require adequate and stable funding, which could be relied upon and planned for, from year to year.
Indeed, back in 2002, when the Rozanski Report was released examining the effectiveness of Ontario’s education funding formula, he outlined “Adequacy” and “Stability” as two key guiding principles for any funding formula to work.
However, School Boards have not received funding that could be described as either adequate or stable over the past two decades. In a December 2015 report, Ontario’s Auditor-General confirmed underfunding by the Province to School Boards for school repairs between the years 2011-2016 was $5.8-billion. Furthermore, school boards are left wondering what funding will be allocated from year to year, with no long-term commitment from the Province.
Stability and adequacy. So simple … yet so elusive under the Ontario’s current education funding formula.