Rene' Jansen in de Wal

Moving to failed US style education is a failure and has eroded the world class education system Ford inherited 8 years ago. Over $6.3B in cuts hurts kids and communities. Ontario deserves better. Imagine better. Demand better.

Centralized control to impose and refusal to consult or collaborate are indicators of ideologically driven simplistic policy that fails students, families and communities. Cuts that hurt kids are a clear view of govt failure. Ontario is better than that. Imagine better.

Teaching has never been a profession that lacked accountability for teachers.

Teachers are observed.

Evaluated.

Measured by student outcomes.

Expected to justify decisions.

Document everything.

Attend professional development.

Adapt to new initiatives.

Meet changing standards.

Teachers understand that this comes with the profession. What they struggle with is when it becomes an endless stream of paperwork, meetings, and compliance tasks that pull them away from their students.

Most teachers aren't asking to avoid accountability.

They're asking for something much simpler.

Trust.

Trust them to use the professional judgment they've spent years developing.

Trust them to know when a lesson needs to slow down because students are struggling.

Trust them to know when a child needs encouragement instead of another form to complete.

Trust them to teach rather than constantly proving they're teaching.

Somewhere along the way, education became increasingly focused on paperwork, compliance, and documentation. Every new initiative promised to improve outcomes, yet many teachers would argue that each new layer of bureaucracy simply took more time away from the one thing that matters most: teaching children.

The irony is that the teachers who consistently make the biggest difference in students' lives are rarely the ones who spend the most time completing paperwork.

They're the ones who spend the most time building relationships, planning engaging lessons, giving meaningful feedback, and being fully present in the classroom.

Every hour spent ticking boxes is an hour that can't be spent preparing a better lesson.

Every unnecessary form is time that could have been spent helping a struggling student.

If we want better schools, we don't necessarily need more policies, more meetings, or more paperwork.

We need to give great teachers the time, freedom, and professional trust to do what they became teachers to do in the first place.

If you could remove one unnecessary task from a teacher's workload tomorrow, what would it be?

When someone says we can't afford good healthcare, public education and retirement in dignity, ask yourself who is paying for News and media to keep telling you that? Then watch what politicians are doing and saying to see who they are listening to.

Ford has eroded the world class education system he inherited 8 years ago with cuts of $6.4B. World class systems provide what students need to succeed. ‘Putting kids first’ requires support not a slogan.