Apr 12, 2021
By Christine Ross
Ontario schools will move to online learning next week, indefinitely.
“Today, we’re taking further action, and moving schools online only after the April break,” announced Premier Doug Ford.
Ford cautions we haven’t even hit the peak of wave three and community spread is too high to risk having students gather.
“This was not an easy decision, but it was the right decision, childcare for non-school age children will remain open but before and after school programs will be closed and we will also provide free emergency childcare for school aged children for healthcare and front line workers.”
Ford says Ontario will monitor trends to see when they will return to in-class learning. Special Education students will remain in-person.
Liberal leader Steven Del Duca is calling for Education Minister Stephen Lecce to be fired the day after Lecce assured parents schools wold remain open.
But Lecce says the decision to change course is based on recent discussions with health officials. “Based on discussions we had with Dr. Williams and the medical teams over the past hours, needing to act quickly and decisively, we made this decision as difficult as it is,” said Lecce.
Opposition Leader Andrea Horwath says the province is being thrown into chaos.
“It is really shameful to have watched the Minister of Education claim that schools were safe because he wanted to avoid taking any action to make sure they were safe and so here we are with parents, educators and students facing another shutdown.
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