There’s a common expression: where there’s smoke, there’s fire. That is why the Ontario Teachers’ Federation (OTF) remains concerned about the announcements and actions by the Ontario government since the pandemic began. While any one of these alone are cause for concern, taken together, the spectre of the privatization of and profiteering from our publicly funded education system may be going largely unnoticed until it’s too late. Take, for instance, EQAO’s two recent tenders for online test developers for the Grade 9 Mathematics Assessment and the Math Proficiency Test. Add in TVO’s expanded mandate, under Bill 197, to develop a warehouse of virtual courses for the 2020-2021 school year to meet the government’s mandatory secondary two online course credits for graduation requirement. Recent public pronouncements and policy adjustments by the Minister of Education look and feel like the world class publicly funded education system in Ontario is being propelled in a direction that risks undermining it.
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