Education Minister Stephen Lecce has announced a plan to cut building time for new schools in half as Ontario looks for ways to meet the needs of the province’s expanding population.
“Hundreds of thousands of people will be moving to Ontario in the coming years and it simply cannot take a decade to build [a] school in this province any longer,” Mr. Lecce said. “We’re unveiling a plan that will reduce the timelines by 50 percent.”
The province is sinking roughly $15 billion into school construction over the next decade under a revamped model that will see a reduction in planning and approval times.
“That’s $550 million every year to build new schools and to maintain existing schools,” Mr. Lecce said, adding that the province would prioritize projects that are “shovel ready,” and come with realistic costs and timelines.
Aside from cutting back on red tape, the program will offer standardized school designs for school boards to choose from in a bid to streamline the planning process, he said. The province will impose construction timelines and benchmarks that school boards must meet.
Mr. Lecce said the changes were a long time in coming, adding that the last time the process was “meaningfully overhauled” was more than 12 years ago.
Mr. Lecce said new legislation tabled April 17, dubbed the “Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act,” would be an “overhaul” of the system, intended to improve transparency for parents and ensure the education system is focused on improving student outcomes in “back to basics” learning.
The act, he said, is based on three key pillars: more accountability, building new schools faster, and improving training for educators. He said the legislation would “enhance the rights of parents” in the education system and authorize “new transparent reporting requirements.”
