The Toronto District School Board is considering cutting music instructors, closing swimming pools and shuttering outdoor education centres in a bid to eliminate a projected $70 million deficit for the coming school year.
A report to be tabled next week says the TDSB is looking at possibly closing its 66 swimming pools and eliminating 86 aquatic instructors unless it can come up with a plan to operate the pools on a cost-recovery basis. The report says that of the 66 pools it operates and maintains, 27 are leased to the City of Toronto, two are leased privately, and the remaining 37 are permitted out. The board says that getting out of the pool business would see a cost savings of more than $12 million.
Coun. Josh Matlow, along with TDSB Trustee Shelley Laskin, say learning how to swim is “an essential part of a child’s education,” and they have launched a petition calling on the province to “take responsibility and step in to protect these neighbourhood assets.”
The report also highlights cutting 74 music instructors, which would save about $4 million, and changes to the one-to-one device program, in which students in Grades 5 to 12 receive a new Chromebook for educational use. It would be scaled back to begin in Grade 7, which would result in a savings of approximately $4.5 million.
The report will be discussed at a special meeting of the Finance, Budget and Enrollment Committee next Wednesday.
The TDSB notes that while the Ministry of Education requires school boards to present a balanced budget each year, it faces a structural deficit due to underfunding of statutory benefits, the inability to close underutilized schools, and the fact that grant revenue has not kept up with the cost of inflation.
On February 27, 2025, the TDSB had a projected deficit of almost $66 million for the 2025-26 school year. That number increased to more than $70 million after the board added back 28 unfunded Vice Principals that had previously been removed from staffing allocation.
The TDSB says it was set to implement a deficit recovery plan approved last September, which would have cut the deficit to $11 million. However, the Ministry of Education rejected that plan on April 23, 2025, while indicating it would appoint a financial investigator to address the board’s ongoing deficit.
