Each budget cycle, the provincial government seeks input from education partners across the province as it determines its education funding for the coming budget. As always, Fix Our Schools took the opportunity to provide input and our recommendations in our submission to the Ontario government’s budget consultation process.
This year, the Ford government’s main ask was for submissions focused on how the government ought to plan for a budget that
- protects Ontario’s economy and workers
- creates more jobs
- keeps taxes low and costs down
- delivers better services
- gets critical infrastructure projects built
We believe that investing in the publicly funded education of Ontario’s youth is critical to a strong economy and that in order to do this, our government must ensure that every publicly funded school in the province is considered critical infrastructure and is safe, well-maintained, healthy, and provides an environment conducive to learning and working.
We continued to call on this government to lift the school closure moratorium that has been in place since 2017 and adopt a new approach to school closures. We also continued to call on this government to develop and implement a Standard of Good Repair for Ontario’s publicly funded schools, which would include transparent metrics for school buildings, portables, and schoolyards, addressing:
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- The $16.8-billion+ of disrepair in school buildings
- A program to assess current repair backlogs in portables and schoolyards
- Air quality and ventilation
- Classroom temperatures
- Accessibility
- Environmental efficiency & durability
- Job site safety for school construction projects and maintenance work
- Drinking water
- Asbestos
- Cleanliness
- Classroom space
- Vermin, mold
- Fire and electrical code
Finally, we called on the government to prioritize publicly funded schools by ensuring they receive adequate, stable, equitable provincial funding that would allow school boards to meet these provincial standards and publicly demonstrate positive outcomes by collecting and releasing associated metrics at regular intervals.