School Board Governance in Ontario: Long Overdue for a Complete Government Overhaul

An Open letter to Hon. Paul Calandra, Minister of Education, Debbie L. Kasman, Education Consultant, 2025

May 18, 2025

To the Honourable Paul Calandra,
Minister of Education,
900 Bay Street,
Toronto, Ontario,
M7A 1L2

Dear Minister Calandra,

As you are aware, on February 27, 2025, your government won its third straight majority government under Premier Doug Ford, and you were named as Education Minister on March 19, 2025, replacing Education Minister Jill Dunlop who was the Education Minister for seven months.

After being sworn in as Education Minister, you announced that you would be “relentless in ensuring school boards stay focused on what matters most: equipping students with the tools they need to succeed,” in a video you released on April 23, 2025.

You also held a press conference announcing that your government was increasing school board accountability to protect students, families and taxpayer funds to ensure school boards are supporting student success and skills development, in response to a number of cases of financial mismanagement by school boards.

You also stated that your government was taking immediate measures to increase oversight at “several school boards of particular concern,” stating that your government had recently appointed third-party reviewers and investigators to examine several school boards’ use of finances and resources as follows:

Thames Valley District School Board

In response to reports of a three-day retreat by the Thames Valley District School Board in downtown Toronto in August 2024 — where senior board officials used board funds to stay at the former SkyDome hotel — the province appointed PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP to investigate the board’s finances and executive pay practices. The board has been running a significant deficit for a number of years and has had to cut back on services to students, making this expenditure more concerning.

The investigator’s report revealed instances of non-compliance with the Broader Public Sector Executive Compensation Act, 2014 and with the board’s own policies and procedures as they pertain to compensation frameworks. In addition, the board is projecting an accumulated deficit in the 2024-25 school year which, the report found, will likely continue into the 2025-26 school year. Moreover, there are indications of potential financial mismanagement.

Based on these findings, the investigator recommended control of the board be vested in the ministry. This will allow the board to get back on track and undertake the necessary steps to improve its financial position.

Brant Haldimand Norfolk Catholic District School Board

In response to an incident in which four trustees incurred nearly $190,000 in expenses ($63,000 of which were in legal fees to manage the fallout) related to the Italy trip in July 2024 to purchase religious art for two new schools, the Minister of Education appointed Aaron Shull to conduct a governance review of the Brant Haldimand Norfolk Catholic District School Board. Mr. Shull’s report found mismanagement of public funds, a disregard for transparent decision-making and non-compliance with their own procurement policy.

The report clearly outlines governance dysfunction with the board and significant shortcomings in their financial oversight and purchasing processes. Following the report, the board is expected to consider the 18 recommendations that will strengthen fiscal responsibility, improve transparency and address executive compensation and governance issues, along with four additional action items from the Minister:

•   repay the amounts owing for trustee travel expenses within 30 days;
•   recoup the total funds spent on the art and artifacts purchased in Italy within 30 days;
•   attest to conduct its business only in meetings compliant with regulations and legislation;
•   submit a learning plan for trustees’ professional development highlighting governance responsibilities.

The ministry has sent the full list of recommendations and comments to the board and the board is required to submit an implementation report on the steps they are taking to address each of the recommendations by May 23.

Toronto Catholic District School Board

In August 2024, after the board forecasted a significant accumulated deficit, the ministry engaged Deloitte LLP to identify the reasons for their deteriorating financial position and recommend savings measures to help the board return to a balanced position. This work revealed that the board could have done more to avoid their deteriorated financial position.

The ministry is now appointing a financial investigator to validate the school board’s current financial position and recommend whether control and charge of the board should be vested in the ministry. The investigator will present a report of their findings to the Minister of Education by May 30.

Toronto District School Board

In December 2024, the Auditor General of Ontario issues an extensive report on the board’s school safety, financial management and capital planning. It echoed many of the serious concerns the ministry has voiced to the school board on numerous occasions over the past few years, including a letter issued to them last year outlining the board’s inability to meet its financial responsibilities under the Education Act.

The board was directed to submit a multi-year financial recovery plan to address major ongoing financial issues such as recurring deficits, failure to manage senior leadership staffing costs and millions of dollars in historical underspending to address school building age and conditions. To date, the board has not produced a trustee-approved recovery plan to ensure fiscal management requirements are met, resulting in significant financial concerns over the school board’s financial health and their ability to address their structural deficit.

Furthermore, in October 2024, the Minister of Education appointed Patrick Case to review the Toronto District School Board’s field trip policies and procedures after students attended a rally in September 2024. The final report shows a lack of judgment and poor planning for student emotional safety.

Ottawa-Carleton District School Board

Since 2021-22, the school board has been reporting in-year deficits, and it is reporting another shortfall this year. At the end of the 2023-24 school year, the board had completely depleted its reserves. The ministry is now appointing a financial investigator to validate the school board’s current financial position and recommend whether control and charge of the board should be vested in the ministry. The investigator will present a report of their findings to the Minister of Education by May 30.

(Ministry of Education, Ontario Taking Action to Protect Students, Families and Taxpayer Funds, April 23, 2025, Retrieved at https://news.ontario.ca/en/backgrounder/1005816/ontario-taking-action-to-protect-students-families-and-taxpayer-funds.)

These reviews and investigations are a crucial part of the government’s continuous efforts to uphold trust in the province’s publicly funded education system.

How did we get here?

It is crucial you understand the history of education governance and education governance reform within Ontario’s education system, Minister Calandra, before making any decisions about how to move forward.

Education policy in Ontario has undergone significant change since the 1990s and the early years of the 21st century. Changes have occurred in many areas of education policy influence, including curriculum, program structure, provisions for student diversity, accountability, governance, funding, teacher professionalism, teacher working conditions, school safety, and school choice.

(Anderson, S., & S. Ben Jaafar, Policy Trends in Ontario Education, 1990-2003, Working Paper Sub-Project 2 of “The Evolution of Teaching Personnel in Canada,” SSHRC Major Collaborative Research Initiatives Project 2002-2006, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto, September 2003, p. 3.)

Moreover, since the 1990s, political control over the provincial government has shifted from David Peterson’s Liberal Party (1986-1990) to the New Democratic Party led by Bob Rae (1990-1995) to the Conservative Party and Mike Harris (1995-2002) and his successor Ernie Eves (2002-2003) back to the Liberal Party led by Dalton McGuinty (2003-2013) and his successor Kathleen Wynne (2013-2018) and back again to the Conservative Party with Doug Ford (2018-present) again.

You are the 17th education minister Ontario has had since 1993. Ontario has had 6 education ministers since 2018 alone, with 5 being in the role less than one year. I am deeply concerned that a great deal of information has been lost in the transition between various different ministers of education and various different governments.

Furthermore, we are currently living in very unsettled times and our education system is suffering. In 2015, Margaret Wilson, an educator with over 40 years experience and the first Registrar of the Ontario College of Teachers, conducted a Review of the Toronto District School Board and noted “a consistent and persistent call from within for help.” Wilson wrote that she was “deeply disturbed by the acute level of distress” which was apparent in the board.

(Wilson, M. Review of the Toronto District School Board, Executive Summary, Submitted to the Honourable Liz Sandals, Minister of Education, January 15, 2015, p.4, Retrieved at https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/31488/province-directs-tdsb-to-change-board-policy-practice-and-governance-structure.)

The December 2024 Auditor General’s extensive Report of the Toronto District School Board’s (TDSB’s) school safety, financial management and capital planning also shows a rate of violent incidents that is currently at the highest level recorded for the TDSB, financial and capital resources that are not consistently being allocated in the most cost-effective or efficient way, mental health and wellness staffing that has not increased at the same rate as the demand for services, and that Principals and Vice-Principals are frequently being placed on lengthy paid leaves while under investigation.

(According to the Auditor General’s 2014 report, TDSB policy states that in an investigation of an incident or complaint, the practice of placing an employee on paid leave should be rarely used. However, between 2018/19 and 2022/23, the TDSB placed 53 (80%) of the 66 principals and vice-principals being investigated for allegations, such as discrimination and workplace harassment, on paid leave (ranging from one to 1,218 days), costing approximately $4.3 million. For the sample of 15 investigation files the Auditor General reviewed, the TDSB could not provide documentation to show that placing the principals or vice-principals on paid leave was the necessary course of action instead of finding alternative work arrangements or temporarily relocating them without compromising student or staff safety. For the 51 investigations that were started and completed between 2018/19 and 2022/23, 19 (37%) took longer than the 150 days TDSB’s internal policy says investigations should be completed by, and 10 of these took more than a year to complete.)

Those consistent and persistent calls for help from within the TDSB, that began with Wilson’s review 10 years ago, are now coming from within and without the TDSB – from employees and some trustees in other school boards, from unions, parent groups, religious groups, the Ontario Human Rights Commission, Ontario’s Ombudsman and even Ontario’s Auditor General.

It is clear that something needs to be done. School Board Governance in Ontario is long overdue for a complete government overhaul. The current governance model is 218 years old, and there has been an evolution of flaws through to 2025, some dating from the 1990s, which need significant repair. Some of the flaws have developed because times have changed, and the structures and systems that once worked well for us, no longer serve their intended purpose.

Enclosed you will find an overview and narrative of education policies, policy trends, reviews, reports, commissions, consultations, investigations, and audits extending from 1990 to 2025. I believe this overview and narrative will help you understand the complex challenges with which Ontario’s education system is now faced.

It is critical that you have an understanding of the past and how Ontario’s education system arrived at this point in order to face the challenges head on in your role as Education Minister and in order to determine how to move forward. As Winston Churchill famously said, if we don’t learn from history, we are doomed to repeat it.

I offer this overview and narrative – a Review of the Governance Structure of Ontario’s Education System, if you will – via this open letter, to you, your provincial government, and to Ontario’s education system at large, as a gift to you, your government, and Ontario’s two million students and their parents.

For the period 1990-2003, I draw heavily on a Working Paper called Policy Trends in Ontario Education written by Stephen E. Anderson and Sonia Ben Jaafar from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. This was a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Major Collaborative Research Initiatives Project from 2002-2006, which draws heavily on R. D. Gidney’s landmark history of Ontario from the 1950s onward through the first three years of the Harris government’s “Common Sense Revolution” (Gidney1999).

For the period 2003 to 2010, I draw heavily on a paper called Education Governance Reform in Ontario: Neoliberalism in Context, written by Peggy Sattler in 2012 when she was a student at the University of Western Ontario, prior to Sattler’s election as NDP Member of Provincial Parliament for London West in 2013. (Sattler also served as Trustee on the Thames Valley District School Board for 13 years, including 2 terms as Board Chair.)

For the period 2010 to present, I draw on my own personal experiences working within Ontario’s education system as Principal Assistant to the Superintendent for Special Education and Acting Executive Superintendent for Curriculum and Special Education at the Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board, and also at the Ministry of Education as Student Achievement Officer.

In this review, I refer to key policy and reports such as the 1995 Royal Commission on Learning, Bill 160, the Education Amendment Act, Bill 177, the Student Achievement and School Board Governance Act, Bill 98, and the Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act as well as various consultations, governance advisory panels, investigations, audits and school board reviews that were completed beginning in 2015 with the Review of the TDSB.

I believe it is necessary to consider all of these key policies, reviews, consultations and reports – not just the financial ones – for a complete understanding of the evolution of Ontario’s education system since 1990 and prior. I also believe this is the only review of its kind in Ontario beginning in 1990 and stemming to present day.

It is my firm belief that if your government were to implement the vision outlined in this review, system change would occur faster than most people realize. These changes would also give hope to the many educators, trustees, parents, religious groups, the Ontario Human Rights Commission, Ontario’s Ombudsman, and Ontario’s Attorney General who have grown deeply concerned about the capacity of Ontario schools to deal with the complex challenges with which your government and Ontario’s education system are currently facing.

This vision will also help you and your government rise to the challenge of preparing Ontario’s two million students, along with their parents, with what will no doubt be a promising – but very intimidating – future.

Respectfully submitted,

Debbie L. Kasman
Education Re-imagined | Analyst & Researcher | Author & Speaker | M. Ed. Policy Studies | OISE/University of Toronto

To read the Review, click:

School Board Governance in Ontario: Long Overdue for a Complete Government Overhaul