1. Parent Workshop – Chinese Community
On Saturday March 27th, we held a comprehensive parent information session at Eastview Neighbourhood Community Centre for the Chinese newcomer families in our community.  With sessions in Mandarin and English on family literacy, special education, and relating to the school system we were able to reach many parents who face some challenges accessing information about their child’s education.  I am hoping to run similar sessions for other groups of parents/guardians and also looking for ways to improve the sessions and reach even more parents.  If you have any ideas about how best to reach parents, what information might be most helpful, and what you would like to see in an information session, please let me know.

2. Babysitting Class 
Also on Saturday March 27th, we held the third Red Cross Babysitting class this year for students in our area at Earl Grey Sr PS.  The demand for this very popular class seems to be levelling off for now, so unless there are requests for another one this school year, I will not organize the next class until the fall.  If you think you know of enough students who are interested, let me know.  The class is for 11-14 year olds and needs about 15 participants to run.

3. Full Service Schools

• School Visits:

As you aware, I have been attending school council meetings in order to discuss the idea of Full Service Schools. I have been thrilled at the robust conversations we have been having and the positive ideas that have emerged. What I have heard so far is that you think the idea of using the “excess” space in our schools to support public services for children, youth and families is a great idea and that finding a process that would integrate education, health and social services is a great step toward schools as a hub of support. I will continue to visit with schools and keep you updated on the progress of the Full Service School Task Force and the opportunities for involvement at the local level.
Here are the dates of my remaining school council visits.

• Board Motion for Community Partnerships:

At the March 10 Board Meeting, I am happy to say that the Board supported my motion “Enabling Community Partnerships to Create More Community Hubs.”  This intent of the motion was to begin discussions about how the TDSB can allow government-funded and community-based agencies into unused school spaces, while ensuring the safety of our children. You can take a look at the full motion on page six of this document.

• Current Community Use of Schools Programs:

The Ministry of Education is currently funding a number of different initiatives supporting community use of schools.  The two that are most relevant to our community are the Priority Schools Initiative and Focus on Youth.  Both programs provide community agencies with free use of school space: Focus on Youth for summer programming and the PSI for after-school and weekend programs all year round in 77 TDSB schools that have been designated “priority” by the Ministry and the Board.  There are four PSI schools in our ward:  Bruce Jr PS, Leslieville Jr PS, Queen Alexandra MS and Wilkinson Jr PS.  If you are interested in applying for space at these schools, take a look at the PSI page of the TDSB website; if you are interested in Focus on Youth (which also offers summer jobs to TDSB high school students), see the FOY page.


4. School-Based Staffing Allocation
At the March 10 Board meeting, trustees voted to approve the school-based staffing allocation for 2010-2011. This includes:

• The addition of 19 Aquatics Instructors to reflect the previous Board resolutions to open pools (including the pools at Monarch Park CI and Earl Grey Sr PS);
• Hiring 190 Early Childhood Educators as part of the Province’s Early Learning Program; and
• Rejecting the proposal to reduce regular program Education Assistants by 140.

You can find the full list of staffing numbers here (page 1).

5. Parent Satisfaction Survey 2009-10
As part of a Board process to improve parent engagement, a Parent Satisfaction Survey is being conducted across the TDSB. This is an opportunity for parents to provide feedback about our schools. The survey will be available online in 22 languages beginning on Tuesday April 6 and can be accessed at: www.tdsb.on.ca/parentsurvey.

6. Farewell to Jill Worthy
The wonderful Jill Worthy, Superintendent for most of the schools in Ward 15, is retiring from the TDSB at the beginning of this month and taking a position with the new Early Learning Department at the Ministry of Education.  Her interim replacement will be Ian Allison, who will be with us at least through the end of this school year, at which point there will be a process to decide on a more long-term Superintendent for the area.  I know we will miss Jill very much here in Toronto-Danforth.



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