Sir James Whitney School for the Deaf on Dundas Street in Belleville. (Photo: Nicole Kleinsteuber / Quinte News)
The Ontario Ministry of Education has made a decision on the province’s demonstration schools for kids with severe learning disabilities, like Sagonaska in Belleville, but the schools’ proponents say it’s not enough.
In a statement today, Minister Liz Sandals says the application process at all four of the provinces demonstration schools will resume for the 2016/17 school year at least, but no long-term commitment has been made, to actually keeping the schools open.
President of the Sagonaska Parent Council, Lesley Lehman, says that still leaves a load of unanswered questions.
Lehman added, she hopes teachers who were already assigned to Sagonaska will be able to easily re-apply.
Progressive Conservative MPP for Prince Edward-Hastings Todd Smith agrees that just keeping registration open is not enough and the government is just “making up policies on the fly, like they always do”.
Lehman, Smith and other supporters also say, since no long-term commitment has been made, a protest and rally aimed at saving demonstration schools scheduled for Queen’s Park tomorrow, will still go ahead as planned.
Lehman says six bus loads will still be heading to Toronto, just from the Quinte Region alone.
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She adds that any MPP who is unaware of the issues, regardless of their political stripe, will know the whole story by the end of the day tomorrow.
