OCSTA (Lazarus) wakes up and rejects governance proposal
TORONTO – OCSTA concerns re Governance consequences of the Proposal for Regulation Under the Education to Require Confirmation of School Board Resolutions and Motions… have been raising alarm among people with children in schools, Teachers’ union groups and anyone with an interest, economic or ideological in education or with transparency in anything.
Before we begin, the Education is the second most cost heavy line item in the Provincial budget. Depending on how the reporting decisions are made, Education accounts for “in class expenditures” of $31 billion to approximately $40 billion per year.
This piece refers to the reaction on the part of Catholics in English language Boards. Moreover, it is influenced heavily by the alleged “prompts” cited by the Minister that led him place under supervision eight of the 72 boards in the province: incompetence, mismanagement and abuse of office. Additionally, no staff were dismissed – except in Toronto Public.
After a year in a state of silent dormancy, or worse, OCSTA found reason to react before matters worsen for Catholic schools. The proposal, they claim, “prejudicially effects denominational rights, increases administrative costs and red tape, harming the relationship between Catholic School Trustees and Senior Officials [ … who’s the boss?] …and the regulation as written diminishes good governance”.
Welcome back Lazarus! The skeptics and cynics who see a looming deadline for registering to seek office to school boards have just been given a platform on which to run. OCSTA (Lazarus) enumerates eight reasons why the Government proposal is a recipe for disaster:
- Throws a wedge between Senior staff and trustees (their employer)
- Will cause tension/conflict when they disagree on timing for compliance or deny compliance altogether
- Further delay decision-making thus delaying timely and effective service required by parents, students, by-laws, collective agreements and the Ministry
- Blur the lines of transparency and accountability between trustees and Staff
- Create confusion among Principals in the Home-School-Parish tripartite base
- Result in increased red tape and consequent administrative and legal costa
- Reversing chain of command between CEO/Director (and administrative team) and Trustees
- Exposing the administrative staff to “numerous questions” about conflict-of-interest requirements by them
The disaster intimated above was already in the works before Supervision was imposed. Trustees could only decide on the “expert advice” provided by Senior Staff. Equipped with advisors from the Ministry, the “public sector agencies”, legal teams, communication teams, parliamentarians and ad hoc experts to fit the occasion, staff could manipulate and exploit every perceived weakness in individual trustees.
The example of the Toronto Catholic District School Board Senior Administrative team is classic. It declared – and trustees confirmed – a $100 million surplus in February of 2024 and reversed it by November into a $40 million declared and confirmed deficit. This in turn jumped to $48 million by May of the following year: a $148 million change for the worse.
Every senior staff received accolades and a raise. Meanwhile, fewer children are being registered to attend their schools. Fewer children result in fewer grants for student needs. OCSTA may be “late into the game”, but it is not wrong.