The supervisor appointed by the province to manage Ottawa’s largest school board is holding meetings with the chairs of school councils as a “pilot project” to learn what’s important to families.
Bob Plamondon, an auditor and expert in governance,
took over responsibility for Ottawa-Carleton District School Board
in June over the province’s concerns about financial “mismanagement.” In all of the five Ontario boards under supervision, the role of elected trustees to make decisions and
help parents navigate the school system
has been suspended.
Plamondon has publicly said little about his conclusions so far and has given
no media interviews
.
But speaking to the members of the OCDSB’s parent involvement committee on Wednesday night, Plamondon said he had been holding meetings with the chairs of school councils at each of the board’s six superintendencies.
So far, he has held three meetings with between 25 and 30 people at each. There are three sessions more to go by the end of December.
“We go around the table and ask all of the parent council chairs to introduce themselves and to put on the table their most pressing issue that they want to talk about,” Plamondon said.
“There’s no pre-set agenda. It’s open dialogue. It’s a town hall meeting. As you go around the table, you find that most of the parents have similar concerns, and so they build on each other. And then we have, for 90 minutes or so, a roundtable discussion that goes back and forth.”
The top issues so far have included funding, getting more education assistants in the classroom, improving school facilities, safety in the classroom and transportation. Parents have also asked about the
controversial elementary program review
, which included boundary changes slated for September 2026 that
have been cancelled
. There have also been a lot of questions around what’s ahead for supervision, he said.
Scott Walker, the chair of the school council at Queen Mary Street Public School, told the parent involvement committee he liked the town hall format.
“What I noticed was there’s a lot of overlap in the questions, but there was also a lot of very individual things that kind of came through that I don’t think we would have heard about if it hadn’t been for that platform,” Walker said.
Plamondon said the town hall idea was “innovative” and he didn’t believe they had been used anywhere else in the province. Survey results have shown that participants were “thrilled” with the opportunity, he said.
But some have expressed skepticism, questioning why more people can’t attend the meetings.
There’s nobody to stop people at the door, but it might not be as effective with more people, Plamondon responded.
“If it looked like a fishbowl with, you know, 100 people around the room, the dynamic would change,” he said. “I think having a lead from each school and having a relatively small group facilitates an active, even vulnerable, discussion that might not feel as comfortable if it’s a large group. But we’re not blocking anyone.”
Alison Telford, a member of the parent involvement committee, told Plamondon what he heard at the meetings shouldn’t have come as a surprise.
“More EAs (education assistants) in the classroom, more funding, that should just be common sense. You’re hearing that from the teachers. You’re hearing that from the parents,” Telford said.
“I appreciate the fact that these meetings are happening. I do fully believe that you’re giving parents the opportunity and the voice. I guess what I’m wanting out of all of this — what all parents are wanting out of this — is what’s the outcome? When are the outcomes going to be published? How long do you have to do this review?”
There are a lot of things that people want to spend money on, Plamondon said.
“Right now, we’re looking to find savings, operating savings and efficiencies in the budget, to balance the budget and also to invest resources back into the classroom,” he said.
“But I think these conversations that are happening at these meetings help to inform the decisions that are coming in next year’s budget and the operating decisions that we’re making today.”
Education Minister Paul Calandra has said he’s considering eliminating the role of trustees.
Trustees have always been responsible for collecting feedback from the community and attending school councils in their zone, said Cathyrne Milburn, an elected trustee. That allowed trustees to meet not just with the chairs, but the community at large, she said.
Plamondon’s pilot project is “better than nothing, but the bar is quite low,” Milburn said.
“These meetings are not publicly accessible to the entire community. I personally only have second-hand account of what happened, but there are no formal records,” she said.
“In addition, these meetings are high level and do not address individual cases. Lastly, the community has no way to hold the supervisor accountable for promises not kept.”
Plamondon told the parent involvement committee that he outlined what he was hearing at the town sessions in his weekly meetings with the Ministry of Education.
“I have that voice because we’re one of the five boards under supervision, so we have direct access. That’s one advantage, and also speaking of the particular requirements and needs that are in this community,” he said.
Last week, Calandra announced that the province was going to introduce “
student and family support offices
” at the five school boards under supervision, starting in January.
Families can expect to get responses to questions within 48 hours and more substantive responses within five days, Plamondon said.
“There’s accountability that is being placed on school boards to be attentive and responsive to parental questions,” he said.
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