Open Letter from 12 Major Disability Organizations, Revealed at Today’s Queen’s Park News Conference, Call on Education Minister Calandra to Safeguard Locally Elected School Trustees and Ensure Parents a Genuine Voice in Their Future

Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance

Learn more by visiting the AODA Alliance website’s education page.

NEWS RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

Open Letter from 12 Major Disability Organizations, Revealed at Today’s Queen’s Park News Conference, Call on Education Minister Calandra to Safeguard Locally Elected School Trustees and Ensure Parents a Genuine Voice in Their Future

 

March 11, 2026 Toronto: At least 120,000 chronically underserved and vulnerable students with disabilities at school boards that Education Minister Paul Calandra now runs face the real danger that things will get worse for them at school, an unprecedented Queen’s Park news conference was told today. Organized by the Ontario Public School Boards Association, speakers at this news conference included representatives of all major players in Ontario’s K-12 education system — school boards, teachers unions, representatives of parents of students with disabilities, and student leaders. Possibly a first, they united around the pressing need to protect and strengthen local democracy when it comes to governing school boards.

 

“Calandra’s ouster of elected trustees has stripped from stressed, beleaguered parents their last resort, short of years of costly human rights litigation, to get their child’s disability-related learning needs accommodated at school,” said David Lepofsky, who was invited to speak at this news conference on behalf of the AODA Alliance, which he chairs. He also chairs TDSB’s Special Education Advisory Committee (SEAC), is a member of the board of Ontario Parents of Visually Impaired Children, has the disability of blindness himself, and is the parent of a child with disabilities. “I don’t recall such a diverse United Nations of Ontario’s education system ever being so united at a Queen’s Park news conference behind a single strong message! It’s an honour for a parent’s advocate regarding the unmet needs of students with disabilities to be invited to share this podium.”

 

At this news conference, the AODA Alliance made public a strong open letter to Education Minister Calandra, set out below, and co-signed by 12 major disability organizations. It emphasizes that students with disabilities and their families need school boards to be governed by open and publicly accountable local democratically elected representatives:

 

  1. “The Ontario Government should put on hold any new legislative reforms to school board governance until a thorough public discussion and consultation has been held on this subject.

 

  1. Any public consultation on the future governance of school boards should fully include the voices and perspectives of parents, school boards, education staff and any subject matter experts and should take into account the recurring unmet needs of students with disabilities.

 

  1. The Ontario Government should establish and make public a detailed plan for the return to local democracy at those school boards now under provincial supervision, with a path to its restoration that sets out clear goals and benchmarks.”

 

“There is ample room to reform the school board trustees system, to make it strong and effective, and to target past shortcomings. It’s not a simple and false choice of either retaining the status quo or totally abolishing local democracy for school boards,” said Lepofsky. “Our simple message is: Mend it. Don’t end it.”

 

The AODA Alliance has highlighted some harms for students with disabilities at provincially supervised school boards, with a focus on TDSB. TDSB’s SEAC has also emphasized these problems:

 

  • TDSB’s supervisor raised the maximum permissible size of two categories of special education classes and the maximum permissible size of Grade 4 to Grade 8 classes. Both increases hurt students with disabilities. A wrenching March 10, 2026 Toronto Today article details how The TDSB provincially-appointed Supervisor’s raising the maximum size of diagnostic kindergarten has hurt students with disabilities.

 

  • Elected trustees regularly met in public and routinely welcomed parents’ public presentations about their concerns. In sharp contrast, the TDSB supervisor works behind closed doors. He has refused to attend any TDSB SEAC meetings. Previously, there were always some trustees in attendance at SEAC meetings.

 

  • TDSB’s Supervisor has implemented none of the recommendations that TDSB’s SEAC forwarded to him to improve education for students with disabilities/special education needs and has not given SEAC an opportunity to be heard on them before making his decision. This disregards regulations that require the trustees (whom the Supervisor replaces) to give SEAC a chance to be heard before deciding on a SEAC recommendation.

 

  • Under provincial supervision, it is harder for TDSB’s SEAC to reach and hear from parents of students with disabilities/special education needs. For example, Minister Calandra banned supervised boards from continuing to livestream SEAC meetings.

 

  • Parents are livid that TDSB is now surveying all parents to find out what should be its spending priorities in next year’s budget and listed special education as an option to rank high or low. This survey wrongly signals to parents that TDSB might deprioritize special education. It makes parents fear that they must battle to retain whatever supports their children now get. TDSB publicly apologized last May to SEAC for doing the same thing in last year’s budget survey. TDSB then committed to listen carefully to their objections in any upcoming surveys. They did the opposite.

 

TDSB’s Supervisor has not taken any actions that we can find that improved education for students with disabilities/special education needs.

 

Contact: David Lepofsky aodafeedback@gmail.com

 

Open Letter to the Premier of Ontario and the Minister for Education for Ontario

March 11, 2026

 

To: The hon. Premier Doug Ford premier@ontario.ca

Room 281, Legislative Building

Queen’s Park

Toronto, Ontario

M7A 1A1

 

The hon. Paul Calandra, Minister of Education minister.edu@ontario.ca

Ministry of Education

14th Floor, 315 Front Street West

Toronto, ON M7A 0B8

Canada

 

Dear Premier and Minister,

 

Re: Meeting the Recurring Unmet Needs of K-12 Students with Disabilities

 

The undersigned community organizations and groups are deeply concerned about the recurring unmet needs of one-third of a million students with disabilities in Ontario-funded K-12 schools. They are concerned that things are not getting better for them and in some ways are getting worse for students with disabilities at the school boards that the Ontario Government has taken over.

 

Too many accessibility barriers have impeded students with physical, sensory, intellectual, mental health, learning, communication or other disabilities from full inclusion in and fully benefitting from educational opportunities in K-12 schools. They are among Ontario’s most underserved, vulnerable students.

 

It is too often hard for parents of students with disabilities to find out what programs, services and supports are available for their children at school and how to access them. School facilities and learning technology too often lack digital accessibility. Students with disabilities are too often told to stay home for all or part of the school day.

 

Parents of students with disabilities too often face bewildering and frustrating barriers when trying to get their school board to effectively accommodate their child’s disability-related learning needs. The education system has too many rigid bureaucratic barriers that handcuff teachers and principals who try to meet the needs of students with disabilities.

 

These disability barriers make it harder for students with disabilities to succeed. They perpetuate the high unemployment rate from which Ontarians with disabilities unfairly suffer.

 

Ontario has no Education Accessibility Standard enacted under the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act. On January 28, 2022, the expert Government-appointed K-12 Education Standards Development Committee submitted its final report to the Ontario Government. That report confirmed the existence of these and many other disability barriers at school. It recommended reforms needed to remove and prevent these barriers. The Government has to date enacted none of those recommendations.

 

Parents of students with disabilities need access to elected trustees to help them navigate the school system and to help them advocate for their children’s disability-related needs. The new Student and Family Support Offices are no replacement for the trustees as an avenue of last resort. These parents also need access to elected trustees to help battle recurring disability barriers at school.

 

The media has reported that the Ontario Government is considering eliminating elected school trustees altogether. There are certainly ways to improve the current system for governing local school boards through local democracy. The status quo is not the best system possible. However, for students with disabilities and their families, local democracy is important. Mend it. Don’t end it.

 

From the perspective of students with disabilities, locally elected governance of school boards should be retained and strengthened. We recommend:

 

  1. The Government should put on hold any new legislative reforms to school board governance until a comprehensive public consultation has been held.

 

  1. This public consultation should fully include the voices and perspectives of parents, including parents of students with disabilities, school boards, education staff and any subject matter experts. It should take into account the recurring unmet needs of students with disabilities.

 

  1. The Government should make public a detailed plan for the return to local democracy at those school boards now under provincial supervision, with a path to its restoration with clear goals and benchmarks.

 

The undersigned are eager to help the Ontario Government with these activities.

 

Signed,

 

  1. Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance
  2. Ontario Parents for Education Supports
  3. Ontario Disability Coalition
  4. Alliance for Equality of Blind Canadians
  5. Citizens with Disabilities Ontario
  6. ARCH Disability Law Centre
  7. Ontario Parents of Visually Impaired Children OPVIC
  8. Canadian National Institute for the Blind
  9. Community Living Ontario
  10. March of Dimes Canada
  11. Ontario Autism Coalition
  12. Autism Ontario