AODA Alliance
Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance
Ontario Autism Coalition
Education Minister Paul Calandra Snubs Parents of Ontario K-12 Students with Disabilities, Refusing to Attend a Virtual Town Hall to Hear About Barriers at School Hurting Their Children
June 18, 2026 Toronto: Today at a Virtual Town Hall livestreamed to the public, parents and guardians of students with disabilities from around Ontario gave two hours of gut-wrenching accounts of their children’s unmet disability-related learning needs in Ontario schools. The AODA Alliance and Ontario Autism Coalition organized this grassroots event to show the Ontario Government and 72 school boards how over 350,000 K-12 students with disabilities require major improvements in the school system. The virtual Town Hall is permanently archived on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMT8vY1Ejts
This Virtual Town Hall was organized as a result of Education Minister Paul Calandra’s commitment to these students when he addressed the Legislature’s Standing Committee on Social Policy on April 27, 2026, saying:
“The level of special education across the province is different from school board to school board. I’m frankly unhappy with that. I’m unhappy with the disconnect between the three ministries that are responsible. I certainly think we can do a better job. I will be spending a significant amount of time over the next number of months seeing how we can better perform when it comes to special education.”
The Ford Government’s controversial Bill 101 gives Education Calandra massive new powers to micromanage the school system, so we invited him to join our Virtual Town Hall, hear what parents have to say, and speak to those attending, said AODA Alliance Chair David Lepofsky who co-moderated the Virtual Town Hall, and who is also Chair of TDSB’s Special Education Advisory Committee. “We very much regret that Minister Calandra did not attend, and did not even answer our invitation.”
“The painful accounts we heard at this Town Hall echo the reports we repeatedly receive from parents of students with disabilities all over Ontario, as well as the findings of our survey on families’ experiences with special education,” said Ontario Autism Coalition vice president Kate Dudley-Logue who also co-moderated the Virtual Town Hall. “We need the Education Minister to listen to these parents, and read our survey’s report.”
Problems that speakers reported included such things as Lack of needed staff support for students with disabilities due to underfunding, Elimination of successful special education programs, students suffering from anxiety caused by the lack of support inn school that led them to absent themselves from school, parents who have trouble doing their job because their child can’t attend school all day, physical inaccessibility of school buildings even when labeled as “accessible,” parents having to navigate months of complex red tape and bureaucracy to fight for the school board to meet their child’s disability-related needs, recurring attitude barriers on the part of some school staff towards their child’s disability and learning potential, lack of funding and long delays to get the diagnosis needed to get support at school and much more.
This is strikingly similar to feedback which the TDSB’s Special Education Advisory Committee received when it held a similar Town Hall for parents of TDSB students with disabilities/special education needs on April 13, 2026. TDSB senior staff strenuously opposed TDSB’s SEAC holding that event, and refused to actively help with its being organized. A video of that event can be viewed on YouTube.
In January 2022, the Ford Government received a comprehensive blueprint on how to fix the school system. It was prepared by a Government-appointed panel of experts drawn equally from the disability community and the educators’ community. The Government has enacted none of their recommendations. That failure contributes to the ongoing barriers facing thousands of Ontario’s K-12 students with disabilities.
As a result of this Virtual Town Hall, the AODA Alliance and Ontario Autism Coalition will work with other disability advocacy groups to ramp up pressure on the Ontario Government to fix a broken,, underfunded and out-of-date special education system.
Contact: Kate Dudley Logue – Vice President, Community Outreach, Ontario Autism Coalition (647) 496-4688
David Lepofsky aodafeedback@gmail.com
Learn more on the AODA Alliance website’s education page and the Ontario Autism Coalition’s website.