With plans underway to start building Ryerson’s Brampton campus and a recent $90 million investment from the province to go towards the institution, education is a timely topic of conversation in the city. Here’s where the province’s four major parties stand on education.
Liberal Party of Ontario
The Liberal government has made a lot of promises regarding education. They say they will:
- Invest $625 million to boost education funding as well as an additional $300 million to improve special education programs
- Provide free full-day daycare for preschoolers starting in 2020 — which would cost $2.2 billion
- Offer grants to lower-income students to cover their tuition
- Fund high school apprenticeship programs to the tune of $410 million
Ontario New Democratic Party
The NDP also has some lofty goals: they plan to invest $1.6 billion over 10 years to:
- Convert student debt into grants and retroactively forgive interest on provincial student loan debt
- Increase child care spaces by 51 per cent of the current levels, adding 200,000 spots
- Make childcare free for families with household incomes less than $40,000 and aim to have lower average costs to $12 per day. The cost would be $375 million the first year, $1 billion the second year, and a whopping $3 billion yearly after 2023.
- End standardized testing like EQAO
Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario
Doug Ford’s platform still isn’t out, but he’s made some commitments when it comes to education including:
- Review the curriculum in core subject areas
- Scrap Wynne’s sex-ed curriculum and replace it with what he deems more ‘age-appropriate’ material
- Consult with parents on new sex-ed curriculum
- Scrap discovery math and replace it with ‘proven methods of teaching.’
Green Party of Ontario
The Green party promises to:
- Keep class sizes low by restricting them to 22 students from grades 4 to 8
- Get rid of standardized testing
- Expand funding for high schools in low-income areas
- Provide interest-free loans for post-secondary education to students in need
- Boost funding for adult education and learning
- Eventually guarantee fully public tuition for all Ontario residents