The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio) - What Could Shape the School Year Ahead in Ontario?

Episode Date: September 9, 2026

As students head back to class, what changes could shape the school year ahead? With teacher labour negotiations underway between education unions and the provincial government, where do talks stand and what could the outcome mean for students, parents, and educators? Kristin Rushowy, education reporter with the Toronto Star, breaks down the latest developments. Then, how will new school transportation guidelines affect families whose children may no longer have access to bus service? Nancy Daigneault, executive director of School Bus Ontario, and Kaylie Fanning, whose brother Joshua has lost access to school bus service, discuss the impact on students and parents as the new school year begins.Donate Today : https://tvo.me/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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And make every month a little more inspiring. Kids across parts of Ontario are heading back to school today. But they're returning to an education system that looks pretty different from the one they left in June. And in the background, labor negotiations are underway. So what's changed? And could a strike beyond the her? I'm Jan Jagannothan, and this is the rundown, back to school edition.

Since the teachers' unions were last at the bargaining table, the Ontario government has made some major modifications to the province's education system, changing who run school boards, what trustees can even do, and even some of the rules inside the classroom. But to understand how we got here, we need to wind back the clock just a little. In April 2025, Education Minister Paul Calandra placed the Brandt-Hawrised the Brandt-Hawramp. called them in Norfolk Catholic District School Board under the province's oversight. That came after an investigation found four school trustees racked up over $140,000 in expenses on a trip to Italy to buy art for new schools.

But that was just the beginning. In the year that followed, the minister put eight other school boards, which represents nearly 40% of students in Ontario, under provincial supervision. While at the same time, reducing the role of trustees in those those boards. Then, in April 2026, the government went even further. It introduced the putting student achievement first act, significantly reducing the role of all trustees across the province, limiting their spending and compensation, and even cutting the number of trustees in some boards. And that matters with teachers sitting at the bargaining table. Normally,

trustees would be there as well. But the changes in the act strip them of power when it comes to those negotiations. The Act also brought in new CEOs at all English language school boards across the province, replacing school board directors. And the changes don't stop at the board office. There are new rules inside the classroom, too. Student attendance and participation now factor into grades. The Act also mandates end-of-term written exams, which will now count for 20 or 25% of a student's final grade. So yeah, there have been a lot of changes, and they're all happening as teachers in the province are in the middle of labor negotiations. To help us understand where things stand and what could happen next, I'm joined by Toronto Star Education Reporter Kristen Rishowey.

Hi, thanks for having me. I appreciate you taking the time. Obviously, it's a busy time for a lot of people in September, but very busy for an education reporter in the midst of negotiations. So before we begin, I do want to mention in the interest of transparency, We want to note that TVO is a provincial agency that falls under the umbrella of Ontario's Ministry of Education. Now, with that, the contract talks with education unions expired August 31st. Where do negotiations stand today? Well, nowhere, actually. The parties started negotiating back in June, and the bargaining system in Ontario for education is arranged, it's two-tier, so that there's a provincial level of talks between the province. government, this year the Council of Ontario Directors of Education and the provincial bargaining units for the unions. So what they've been trying to do is hammer out what issues to handle there.

The unions say that the province is trying to add more issues to that central table and they've appealed to the Labor Board to rule. So we're in limbo right now. When we talk about essentially that bargaining table, who are the two sides? So we've got the province on one end, who's on the other end? So we have the province on one end and this year, which is new, is we have the Council of Ontario Directors of Education. The province added them to the tables saying that, you know, they're on the front lines with the school boards. In the past, it's been the school board associations or the trustee associations who've been at the table. So that is one change that we see this year. On the other side, we've got the unions. So there are the big teacher unions representing public

elementary, public secondary, French, Catholic. And then we've got, of course, QB, which represent support workers, and there are various other smaller unions that also represent support workers, but it's sort of the big five that we talk about mostly when we talk about the unions in the education bargaining. Now, when we talk about the two-tier system and the sort of wants and needs of being more central and what needs to be discussed at local, help us understand what are the main issues still separating the two sides? So typically at the central table, because the provincial government holds the funding purse strings, it's got the money. It's, they deal with the big money issues, salary, working conditions, benefits, and things like that.

And the unions are saying the government now wants to handle things like sick notes, surplus, layoff redundancy notices, timing and processes and things like that. So they say these are things that are better handled locally because, you know, a board in Toronto is different than a board in, let's say, North Bay or Northern Ontario. And they're also accusing the province of sort of trying to centralize that power grab. What does the unions argue in terms of wanting those to be more at the local level? What's their argument there? You know, the argument is that, you know, one size doesn't fit all.

The other argument is that they think the province is trying to take control, centralize more power when it comes to education. You know, the province will say that they would like consistency across, you know, boards for a number of items and that's why they're doing it. So, you know, that's where the impasse is. You have covered a number of bargaining and negotiations in your time as an educational reporter. How different is what we're seeing now compared to years previous? You know, it's not unusual to start a school year without a contract. I actually can't remember a time having covered education as long as I have that the sides did come to an agreement by August 31st. What is different this time is that they haven't really had any meaningful negotiations.

I mean, the summer, you know, they came to the impasse over the summer. Most of the unions did over the issues to be discussed. Went off to the Labor Relations Board and nothing's really happened since. So that to me is the difference that we're entering the school year without having had any meaningful conversations between the two sides. Now, we know that the unions wanted to start this conversation in the negotiations early, hoping to essentially prevent something like this. But the five education worker unions have also now put a dispute before the last,

Labor Bird. Help us understand a little bit. Why did they do that? You know, it's just because they couldn't come to an agreement with the provincial government about what to discuss at the central tables. I mean, there's always a bit of back and forth on this, what should be handled centrally and what should be handled locally. The unions feel this year that the government is overreaching into areas that they feel that local boards and union locals would best handle. And that's where we've come to this disagreement between the two sides that they could not reach any agreement on. You know, the Ontario Catholic teachers, for example, they bargained a little bit longer. Their bargaining dates actually went until the end of August.

And they too say, look, we couldn't come to any agreement on this. We're also going to the Labor Board. So I think we've got pretty much all the education unions now waiting on a Labor Board ruling. Could a strike vote still happen while we wait for the Labor Board? Yes. And I do think that's sort of the next step we'll see. The unions are planning a few in-school days of action, you know, where they've been. might wear similar t-shirts or buttons and things like that and the union leaders may talk to the

media. But yes, so I think strike votes will be the next thing we see. They are legally allowed to do that. And there won't be any job action for some time, though, because they do have to arrange the strike votes. And then there are a number of other steps before we could see any job action. Well, with that being said, teachers, parents, students don't necessarily want to be thinking or having this sort of, you know, potential strike cloud hanging over them as they start a new school year. But what kind of strike action if we're talking, you know, weeks, months down the line could happen if a deal isn't reached. Well, I mean, typically, you know, teachers don't go full throttle into strikes. We see things like work to rule, typically administrative. You know, in the past, I can think that

they haven't, you know, they won't take attendance sheets down to the office, things like that, things that kind of, you know, gum up the system, but don't really affect parents and students. You know, escalations from there can include no extracurriculars. We've seen no comments on report cards. I think at one point there were no parent teacher interviews after hours for report cards and things like that. And then then you get to usually rotating strikes as opposed to full out strikes. Now you mentioned attendance. So I do have to ask. As this school year, there's a number of questions about a few changes that have been made to the system, attendance being one of them. It will factor into high school grades this year. Are there clear rules around what counts as an

unexcused absence that might affect a student's mark. You know, the minister, Minister Paul Glendra, was at a press conference last week and was talking a little bit about it, and there was still some uncertainty. This isn't targeting those kids who are busy and are doing the right thing. What this is about is about those kids who don't have an excused absence from their parents, who sometimes their parents don't even know that they're not, that they're skipping a class. That's what this is targeted. towards, but ultimately, you have to participate and you have to be there.

We're hoping you can help clarify a little bit about that. I think we are seeing a little bit of uncertainty about it, but the message from the provincial government now is things like sports, extracurriculars, even family, extended family vacations can still be allowed. The principal still does have the final say on extended vacations and things like that. But in general, they say things at that end are not going to change. What is going to change is attendance for high school students is now tied to marks. So in grades 9 and 10, it's 15% of a final grade.

It's attendance and participation, right? With the thinking being, if you're not attending, you're also not participating. And then in grades 11 and 12, it would be 10% for every course. So that's the rule. I mean, we've seen and heard from principals' organizations who said we were not consulted on this. We need some clarity. It's very complex dealing with families. And we just need a little bit, some more details about how to handle this on the ground. And I think they are trying to meet with the minister either next week or the week after. You know, because in high schools, midterms come over in, what, November. So they don't really have a lot of time to sort this out. And obviously, this change came from concerns about attendance rates in Ontario schools. Can you give us a little background on that? What were teachers and administrators? seeing when it came to attendance rates?

Yeah, well, this new policy, the education minister, Paul Callander, has said this came from teachers who were concerned about the number of students who weren't showing up for school. I mean, the reasons are myriad, you know, we've, especially post-COVID. So I think about 40% of students in high school aren't meeting the attendance standards, which is, you know, about 17 days of school missed. So it's a huge number of students who aren't coming to school. It increased during COVID, obviously, but hasn't really. gone down since. But, you know, they say maybe let's address this a little bit differently than

being punitive. And that's another message that we're hearing from the principals as well. Well, I'm curious, we've got administrators, teachers, government covered. What are parents and students saying? Well, I think it's just confusion because, you know, especially for students in grade 11 and 12, you know, the difference in marks, you know, if you miss more than 2.5 classes, for example, for an unauthorized absence, you know, that's the difference between a level level four, which is an A and a level three, which is a B in that area of your mark for that class. So that can be the difference between getting into a competitive program at a university or not. So there's a lot of, you know, I think a lot of questions.

Parents are looking to boards to provide that. I think the boards are now looking to the profits to help them out a little bit on that. Another sort of tool in the tool belt that teachers were given this year was essentially a supply portal, $750. that the ministry had given teachers to help get materials that they needed in their classroom. What are we hearing from educators about access to classroom supplies and any challenges they're facing with that portal? Well, the portal opened on September the 1st, and for most boards, I mean, some boards, kids are back at school this week, we'll start next week.

So I think the first concern we heard was this is coming kind of late. They're wondering if the deliveries will happen in time. But anyway, so the portal opened September 1st, and what we heard almost right away from teachers is that they were finding that some items were more expensive on the portal than they were either retail at Staples, which is the vendor for this program. The provincial government has said we have a list of 200 core items. Those are definitely the lowest prices you're going to find anywhere. If there are other things that are more expensive, we're looking to add them so that prices will come down on those as well. Staples also has said that, you know, look, teachers, if you find items that are more expensive than they are in store or on our regular website, we will price match. But I think these are kind of the frustrations. It's a new program and obviously there are going to be hiccups and the minister has acknowledged that. In terms of the items actually are available to teachers, what are we talking about here?

Oh, we're talking about things like, you know, markers, paper, Kleenex, you know, things like that, kind of the basic classroom supplies. I think there's some storage units and things like that as well. You know, the teachers, the spending account is $750, as you mentioned. About half of that is coming from, you know, the existing school budget and the provincial government's providing the other half. So, you know, the minister said, look, we heard from teachers. Teachers do spend a lot of money out of pocket stocking their classroom. So I think on that front, it is welcome.

But I think, you know, these kind of bugs in the system need to be worked out in the meantime. And I'm understanding from the ministry standpoint, from the minister, you know, because this has sort of, you know, launched only last week that, you know, there are going to be some glitches. There are going to be some changes as they make. That's kind of what I gathered from earlier pressers as well. Yes. That's what he said the other day. And he said, look, it's not perfect, right? But, you know, we're working on it. We're going to add more items. And then Staples did send out its own statement saying, please reach out to us. We've got a dedicated line. Let us know about the pricing. You know, I mean, I think the pushback from teachers. has been we don't have time to do that. What should parents be watching for in the coming weeks?

Yeah, I mean, it's kind of watching and waiting, right? You're just waiting for the labor board to rule and then to see how negotiations go. I mean, we've heard from the unions. They've said no job action right away. I spoke with the head of the support staff union and he said, look, if we hit 2027, if we hit March 27 and we'd not had any meaningful negotiations, you know, this landscape's going to look a lot different. So I think for now, for parents, it's mostly just watching and waiting, wait for the Labor Board, see how things progress from there. And in terms of the other changes, I mean, you know, there's some new curriculum coming in. The attendance thing, yes, I think parents, especially of high schoolers, should be keeping an eye

out for notes from their school, from their principal as to how this is going to roll out and what it's going to mean for their kids. Again, it's just the Labor Board. It's all hinging on what the Labor Board rules. So fair to say, this might carry on well into the school year. Yes, it might. Chris, we're going to leave it there. I really appreciate you taking the time.

Thank you so much. Thank you very much. For some families in Ontario, changes won't just be hitting the classroom. Because of new transportation guidelines that impact school buses, some are scrambling to figure out how their kids will even get to school.

Kaylee, thank you so much for joining us. It's been one week since school started four-year brother, Joshua, and you're in a unique situation. You've taken the responsibility of getting him to and from school. I am curious, what has it been like on his first week? Thank you for having me today.

It's been a bit crazy. I'm trying to make sure we get him to the bus on time between all of our work schedules and then having to pick him up. Luckily, where I work, he is able to get dropped off sometimes, but not all the time. And he has to walk to my work in order to actually be with me. but if he is walking, what is that, how long does that take? So if he gets stroked off at this new bus stop,

if he wants to walk down to me, it'll probably be about 20 minutes, but if he wants to walk home, it would be about three hours. Three hours. Three hours. Okay. All right. Nancy, just going to make note. We are in a live construction site. So there is going to be some noises for our viewers and listeners.

So I just want to make note of that. we want to speak to you to better understand why more people like Kaylee and her brother are seeing these changes. You're the executive director of School Bus Ontario, Nonprofit, Association that deals a lot with issues around student transportation. Help me understand there was sort of the funding model that sort of deals with student transportation rule. Yeah, and in 2023 it changed, and they changed it to a needs-based system. And on paper, it looked really good, but sometimes the devil is in the detail and implementation. So the funding model changed and they calculate different things, like the cost of a bus, insurance, bus components, wages and everything else.

Yes. Everything. But that didn't get into the gap that they were facing. All right. I want to come back to Kaylee. Let's show our viewers a map of the region that the student transportation of Eastern Ontario covers. And we'll see a little bit about where the service changes. So right now when we're looking at this map, its service is two school boards.

it forms sort of a U-shape around Ottawa, Brockville, and goes down to Cornwall further south. Now, Kaylee, what's missing in this image right here is Kingston. That's where your family lives, which is outside of the STEO boundaries. But your brother and other family members, from what I understand, historically, have always gone to Perth to school. So tell me a little bit about sort of what the root was before. We actually live like smack dab in the middle of Westport and Godfrey. So Westport's like a 15, 20 minute drive. And we would, we just get picked up from our house.

The bus driver would do his route, pick up my cousins, then pick up my brother, go turn around, back out and do the route he's doing now because it's the same bus drivers last year. But he just isn't allowed to go past the boundary line, which is only the main. 13 kilometers or less from my house. So now I have to go and bring my brother into the boundary in order to get him on the bus because I don't want to uproot his life. We've already had changes last year. So I don't want to make more changes of our life and make him go down to school about

just about an hour away from our house where birth is about 40 minutes. You mentioned changes. Do you mind me asking what changed in your family? My mom passed away last year. So very hard on a boy being 15 years old. And so I don't want to, my dad and I just don't want to change his life even more and make him start a new school when he's already in grade 11. So we just think it's too much to try and change it on him.

I'm so sorry for your loss. I understand that your boyfriend has sort of been kind of helping kind of fill the gaps. Help me understand what does that look like on a day to day? Are we trying to, are we having conversations with the bus driver? Because from what I understand, you know, the bus kind of follows a similar route, though. It just doesn't stop for your brother anymore. Yeah, exactly. I haven't been able to talk to the bus driver because where the bus stop is,

Like I said, it's at an intersection of an 80-kilometer highway. So, like, he's just trying to get the kids on the bus and start moving to keep traffic going. So I haven't been able to actually speak to him. I was going to reach out via text message, but I just haven't had a chance to. Nancy, I asked that question because I'm sure lots of parents, the first point of contact is the bus driver and asking them, what's wrong? The bus driver can't change the route. the bus company can't change the route. The only entity that can change the route is the transportation consortia,

which is the transportation arm of the school boards, STEO, as you mentioned. So the bus driver can't. They're not allowed to, and neither are the operators. We enter into the contracts with STEO or whatever the transportation consortium name is. And so that's part of the problem. They change the walk distances in the 2023 funding model. And not only did it impact people like here, but it also impacted students across Ontario.

After 2023, we had 7,500 students in Ottawa that didn't have student transportation because the operator couldn't pick up those routes for what they were being offered to him, didn't cover his operating costs. In 2024, in Renfrew, we had 10,000 students who didn't have student transportation until November. It was awful because the contracts didn't.

covered the operating costs. This year we came really close to having 50,000 students all across Ontario without student transportation because operating costs are not being covered by this new funding model. And we've had incredible inflation. It's been a double whammy. So from what I understand, you don't believe these changes are for the better? Well, on paper it looked great. The implementation, the devil's in the details, is that they already had existing contracts with the transportation consortia and they're legally binding. It already said you're going to get paid a certain way. The funding formula changed the policy and it was like a square peg in a round hole and it resulted in cuts in some areas, not all, some of them

were smooth and it was fine, but in some areas it did result in funding cuts and the operator had to find ways to absorb those cuts. On top of having to absorb incredible inflationary pressures since COVID. All right, I should mention that we did reach out to the Ministry of Education as well to get a better understanding of sort of the funding model there, but we did not hear back in time for. Now with that, I do want to show some of the changes that you were mentioning. So we do have a board here. This is from the Student Transportation of Eastern Ontario, just to show. And as we can see, for example, here, when we talk about sort of the distances here, grades 1 to 8, if a student lives less than 1.6 kilometers from school, they're generally considered within walking distance of the school and may not qualify for bus services.

Now, Nancy, you were talking a little bit about sort of what we're seeing across the province. I'll help people understand. Obviously, we're here in Toronto, in the GTA. We talk about sort of how vast this province is, how these distances that students have to travel. We're talking about busy highways as well that Kaylee was mentioning as well. Are we seeing this everywhere? Oh, yeah. I mean, there's some schools that don't have pedestrian. and access at all. So there's no way you can walk.

So I love giving an example in East of Thunder Bay. It's a small consortium, three hours east of Thunder Bay. And some of those routes are over an hour and a half one way. So you can't walk that far. So you have to have student transportation. Finding drivers is a real problem for some of those operators in those areas. They're competing with the mining community, which may have higher wages. and we have to keep our wages within a certain benchmark

according to the funding formula and based on how we're going to cover our costs. So some of those drivers are to find. They have to drive two hours to work. That's not necessarily paid for by the province and in our contracts. If one of them gets sick, we have to find someone else from way across another part of the region, sometimes I have to put them up, room and board,

pay for their meals overnight, just to get a student to work. So these things are problematic. Every area is different. The funding formula needs to be based on local needs. And the government will point to increase funding for student transportation. And on paper, there is increased funding. But that doesn't mean increased funding to the contracts

because the contracts are legally binding. They were already in place before these changes. All right, Kaylee, I know you've been trying to get answers, you know, from anyone about the specific changes to the bus route to your family and to your brother Joshua. I am curious, what do you want decision makers to understand about the impact these changes have had on your family? I do understand the costs and stuff, but like it puts us at risks of our jobs, like for certain things. So like, I just would like them to understand that, you know, we would like busing to our house. I mean, I've had busing for 40 years to my house. So,

it's just was quite a shock to have this big of a change. And, you know, luckily, I have a very understanding work at the moment, but, and my boyfriend's able to drive my brother in, but he won't be able to do that all the time. Like, he just works and works this way right now, but in a few months it'll change and he'll be going a different route. So then someone else will have to try and get him there, whether it's my dad and he has to be.

move his stuff or I have to come in and drop him off and be in half an hour to 40 minutes early to work, which I don't get paid for. So it's just a whole bunch of different things changing and trying to work it all out. Nancy, what do you hope, you know, we're hearing it not only from caregivers, from parents, I'm sure from the bus drivers as well about sort of the frustrations here, What do you want decision makers to understand about sort of the changes that we've seen? Well, it has real world impacts, as you can see. Just, I mean, this is an awful story. And all those students in Renfrew and in Ottawa a couple years ago, almost this year as well, that has real world impacts.

And, you know, people have jobs. They rely on student transportation and get to work. You know, we always say the economy starts at the beginning of the day with a school bus. Because parents drop off their kids, they go to work. And that's a reliability. And the system is very fragile right now. And we need the government to understand that the incredible inflationary pressures we've faced over the last five years doesn't cover the costs of student transportation right now.

We'd like a third-party evidence-based review of costs, what it costs on the ground to run student transportation. And that will help us rectify problems like this. Because, you know, when there's no student transportation, it really creates havoc in parents, students' lives. We are going to leave it there. Kaylee, I wish you all the best. I hope things do change or do get better in terms of the bus route and all of that. Nancy, I want to thank you so much for bringing the inside information for us

and better understanding the bus routes. Thank you so much to you both. So there is a lot changing in Ontario schools this year, and one very big question still hanging over it all. Will labor negotiations disrupt the year? We'll be tracking all the developments here on the first. rundown. Until then, I'll see you tomorrow. If you're enjoying this series, please consider supporting TVO with a donation to make more insightful and thought-provoking podcast possible.

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