Blake Ellis/The Independent

“Our education system is in crisis,” said Chandra Pasma, the NDP’s education critic at Queen’s Park, as well as the Ottawa West-Nepean MPP.

Pasma was speaking Wednesday at the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation office in Sarnia during a town hall meeting.

“The Ford government has taken more than $6.3 billion out of the education system since 2018 in funding cuts,” said Pasma. “You can’t take that kind of money out of the system without seeing the impact in every single part of the education system.”

It has meant larger class sizes with students getting less support and less attention Pasma said, pointing to cuts to special education. The MPP says children are not being diagnosed in a timely way and, once they are, there are no other additional resources to meet their needs.

This is something Anna Gould, can attest to. Her child is a Kindergartener in Lambton Kent with global developmental delays as well as ADHD. With wait times and staff availability, he can only get speech and occupational therapy in a six week block, once every two years.

“This is a child who is delayed in every aspect of development,” said Gould. At nearly six years old, his mother says he can not write his own name, doesn’t hold a pencil properly and is just learning to use a zipper. He can’t get speech and occupational therapy again until he is in Grade 2 because he has already completed his first six week block.

Gould said her child’s school has a sensory room as well as resource room, but he can’t access it, because these two rooms aren’t staffed

“The conditions our children are in everyday is not ok,” said Pasma. “We need to be demanding better from the government.”

Students are also struggling with their mental health, said Plasma but only one in 10 schools in Ontario have regularly scheduled access to a mental health professional while half have no access at all.

“So kids are asking for help and there is nobody there to respond to them,” said Pasma. Since kids’ needs are not being met academically, socially as well as their mental health, students are frustrated and that frustration often emerges in violence.

“So we are seeing a crisis of violence in our schools where children are lashing out, not only against other students but against teachers and education workers,” said Pasma. This is resulting in burnout and injury rates among education professionals.

And it has led to a shortage of qualified staff. Pasma pointed to 45,000 teachers who are certified with the Ontario College of Teachers but are not working in the education system.

This has led to job postings being filled by unqualified workers who are teaching with letters of permission.

“People with qualifications are leaving the system because of conditions and the people that are replacing them do not have any qualifications,” said Pasma.

“Teachers are consistently asked to do more with less, As a teacher I can tell you we are trying but we can’t worked miracles,” said Chris Sumner, an English teacher at Great Lakes Secondary School. At Great Lakes, with a student population of 1,150, there are 372 students that require an individual education plan and require extra attention. An education assistant would normally be involved, but there are only three dedicated education assistants for the general student population at Great Lakes, said Sumner.

“The infrastructure of the job is collapsing, and if we don’t do something to stop it, our students, our families and our communities will suffer for it,” said Sumner

That is not the only thing collapsing. Pasma pointed to a $16 billion school repair backlog, with current funding not addressing the dilapidating state of repair. On top of that student transportation funding has been cut.

In the middle of the cuts to education, the Progressive Conservative government to adopt Bill 33, which allows the government to take over a school board anywhere in the province at any time for any reason, the MPP said

“They get to handpick an appointee, who get to make all the decisions regarding education,” said Pasma. The minister of education has already placed seven school boards in Ontario under supervision. This move side lines elected trustees.

“What we are seeing in those boards are decisions that are made in the dark behind closed doors,” said Pasma, adding parents aren’t even aware of decisions that are being considered. Pasma said is concerned the provincial government wants to step in and run all school boards across the province.

“The status quo is not good enough, we need change, but we need that change to be funding and investments in our schools, not shutting out community and local voices, not taking away transparency and accountability,” said Pasma.