"The chair of a school board recently taken over by Ontario's minister of education is defending the board's management and finances, saying the supervision is a "smokescreen" to distract from provincial underfunding. Education Minister Paul Calandra announced Wednesday that he was putting Peel District School Board under supervision due to a plan to lay off 60 teachers and repeated budget deficits."
"Peel board chair David Green says the deficits had always been covered in the past by dipping into the board's reserves, and part of the reason for deficits is that the board has been spending more on special education than it receives for that from the province. Green also says that the loss of teachers from dozens of classrooms aren't "layoffs" of full-time teachers. Rather to save money, resource teachers are being moved into classrooms being covered by long-term occasional teachers, whose contracts are being cut short. Calandra has said that disrupting those classrooms mid-year for about 1,400 students was not acceptable."
Ontario's Education Minister Paul Calandra placed the Peel District School Board under provincial supervision after the board planned to lay off 60 teachers and reported repeated budget deficits. The board is the seventh to face supervision since Calandra became minister. Peel board chair David Green called the supervision a "smokescreen" and said deficits had been covered previously by dipping into reserves. Green said higher spending on special education, beyond provincial funding, contributed to deficits. Green also said teachers removed from classrooms were resource teachers reassigned into classes covered by long-term occasional teachers whose contracts were cut short, rather than layoffs of full-time teachers. Calandra said mid-year disruption for about 1,400 students was unacceptable.
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