Teachers and school boards across Ontario do great things – in spite of poor school building conditions across the province. For instance, last week at Amherstburg Public School, students had to be evacuated to a nearby high school because of a natural gas leak – from a roof-top gas line that, at one time, supplied gas to a classroom’s Bunsen burner.
This situation could have resulted in a very serious accident – even deaths. However, local principals and school board officials worked with emergency crews to graciously and effectively manage the situation. In fact, they even managed to turn the forced evacuation into a leadership opportunity for the high school students and a fun, active, memorable day for the elementary students who were evacuated.
In examining the most current available Ministry data for disrepair in Ontario’s schools, Amherstburg Public School has $6,928,597 of disrepair. In rolling up all the individual school data, total disrepair in the roughly 70 school buildings in Greater Essex County District School Board is a whopping $390,046,914. Disrepair impacts schools all across the province and it must be addressed now!