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London-area education analyst Debbie Kasman, a former teacher, principal and superintendent who has also worked at the Ministry of Education, spoke with LFP reporter Heather Rivers about the travel spending that’s caused controversy at four Southwestern Ontario school boards in the past two months.
Q. Why are we seeing this happening right now?
A. In my opinion, the provincial government has a ‘mini revolt’ on its hands, with school board trustees refusing to do what the government directs school boards to do. School board trustees have existed in Canada since 1807, making them the oldest form of elected representation in the country. School board trustees want to retain their own power rather than doing what the elected provincial government says. These financial decisions are one of the ways trustees are trying to hang onto their dwindling power.
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Q. Has this kind kind of thing happened before?
A. In the past, these types of professional development opportunities through travel did occur. However school boards have been given a very clear directive from the Ministry of Education to be responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars and to ensure as much money as possible reaches students in the classroom . . . beginning around 2012. That’s when York Region District school board trustees had their wrists slapped for excessive travel, after a parent filed access to information requests and found that the board spent more than $130,000 on travel to Finland, New Zealand and London. (There was a moratorium placed on the York board for international travel, but they were put under review five years later because of continued trustee travel and other issues, Kasman said.)
Q. Which of the four recent cases do you find most concerning?
A. The trip to Italy (by Catholic board trustees in Brantford) was the most outrageous. The Blue Jays stadium trip (by Thames Valley District school board officials) was shocking but the trip to Italy kind of blew my mind. There was so much arrogance in that decision because they changed the (airline flights) policy just ahead of the trip – so they didn’t violate the policy. That to me is gobsmacking.
Q. What should the education ministry do to restore public faith?
A. I think public trust and faith has been completely shattered. The provincial government at this point only has one option and that is to completely redesign the education governance structure. It’s clearly not working. The government is playing whack-a-mole here and they can’t keep doing that.
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