After placing eight school boards in Ontario under provincial supervision in 2025, the Province is introducing more changes to the way school boards are run in an attempt to “strengthen school board oversight and accountability and ensure more consistent learning experiences for students,” according to a press release issued by the Ministry of Education on Monday.
In August 2025, Ontario Minister of Education Paul Calandra had threatened to eliminate elected school board trustees ahead of the start of the school year, citing financial mismanagement.
On Monday, he introduced a bill that aims to significantly rein in the roles of school board trustees and “put an end to ongoing governance breakdowns and financial mismanagement,” with the introduction of two new roles in every public and Catholic school board: a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and a Chief Education Officer (CEdO).
While the proposed bill, called the Putting Student Achievement First Act, 2026, will not eliminate the position of school board trustee entirely, their role will be changing “dramatically,” Calandra said.
The bill proposes limits on discretionary expenses for trustees, all but eliminating expense accounts save for “modest, clearly defined budgets in rural and remote boards.” School board trustee honorariums will also be capped at $10,000. In addition, trustees will need to pay for certain membership fees to external organizations out-of-pocket and improve their oversight over subsidiaries and their use of public funds.
Another significant change in relation to trustees is capping their numbers at a maximum of 12 per board – a change that will mainly impact the Toronto District School Board that currently has 22 school trustees.
Calandra clarified that boards that already have less than 12 trustees will be capped at their current number.
“If you have five trustees, you’ll have five trustees. This isn’t a move to increasing the amount of trustees, it’s a move to reducing Toronto’s amount of trustees and freezing the amount in every other board,” he told reporters at Queens Park.
When asked why he chose to retain the role of trustee, Calandra said he decided to keep the role in the interest of consistency across boards.
“The fundamental thing here is I wanted to ensure that we removed the distractions that come from trustees, so the new roles of a trustee will be significantly reduced from what it was before,” he said.
“But I’ve been talking a lot about consistency and I did reflect upon the fact that – as I’ve been saying from the beginning – the French system would remain the same… it’s obvious that the Catholic system still has trustees in charge of denominational issues. So it only seemed fitting [for consistency] that the public system would also have trustees, but at the same time vastly reducing their ability to disrupt the system, vastly reducing their ability to cause division within the system and refocusing them… on advocating on behalf of parents in the system.”
He added that he “will not hesitate” to further gut the role of trustee “should more refinement be needed to refocus trustees even after this legislation.”
The bill also proposes that the Director of Education will become known as the CEO. They will be required to have business qualifications and will be responsible for financial and operational oversight including budgets and staffing.
The CEO will lead budget development and trustees will have the ability to weigh in on the budget with suggestions, but will not be able to make any changes to it. The Minister of Education will have final say over budget matters when trustees cannot come to an agreement and support the CEO’s proposed budget.
The termination of the CEO will also require the Minister’s approval “to help prevent reprisals and dismissals while they are carrying out their responsibilities.”
The Chief Education Officer will be appointed by the CEO and will focus on student achievement. They will be required to have qualifications in education, including a membership to the Ontario College of Teachers or equivalent and Calandra said this role will be filled most likely by an existing school superintendent.
In addition, the bill proposes that the Council of Ontario Directors of Education be made the central employer bargaining agency for English public and Catholic boards “to ensure collective bargaining is led by professional school board staff who have expertise in the board’s operational matters.”
Changes in the classroom
Apart from governance of the boards, the bill is also introducing changes that will affect students more directly, including mandating the use of ministry-approved learning resources in classrooms across the province.
If the bill passes, students in Grades 9-12 will have mandatory written final exams on official exam days in existing courses that already have exams. Calandra said there will be a “significant mark” attached to the final exam. Educators will also be required to provide more clarity on how final marks are calculated.
In addition, attendance and participation in class will be made part of the final mark for students in Grades 9-12. Attendance will be worth 15 per cent for those in Grades 9-10, and 10 per cent for Grades 11-12
“[This change] absolutely reflects what high school teachers have told me would help them get management of their classrooms and would prepare their students for the real world,” said Calandra.
Gesturing to reporters in the press gallery at Queen’s Park, he said “all of you here today, if you’re not here, you can’t call it in, right?”
“You have to be here and do your work. That is what students are going to face when they’re out in public, out working. I’m passionate about this – I hadn’t thought about it until I started speaking with teachers at the high school level who were as passionate as I am about it. I have yet to meet one teacher who hasn’t said to me, ‘You’ve got to do something, attendance and our ability to manage our classrooms and the ability to get the best out of our kids – if they’re not participating – is causing us challenges.’”
He added that exceptions will be made in terms of attendance for students attending sports tournaments, First Nations students who are absent during traditional hunting seasons as well as things like weather-related issues or circumstances out of the students’ control.
The Putting Student Achievement First Act, 2026, also includes the proposed changes to teacher training programs announced on Friday, condensing them from four semesters over two years down to three semesters in a single year.
