PDSB Director of Education Presents Second Annual Equity Accountability Report Card

The board has made little progress in spite of a massive investment in resources which are desperately needed to address academic and behavioral issues

Peel District School Board

By Igor Stravinsky (anonymous Canadian high school teacher)

In my recent essay, Woke Supervisor Hands Back Control of the Peel District School Board, I described how a small contingent of local woke activists were able to take control of the PDSB. Then in, The PDSB is Back Under the Control of the Democratically Elected Trustees, I explained how the PDSB review produced a series of Ministry directives which have served to firmly entrench Critical Theory as the operating principle of the board whether the elected trustees, educators, and residents of Peel like it or not. 

This time around we will look at the board’s own examination of the efficacy of the approach they have taken. Their goal has been to achieve “equity”, defined in Critical Theory as equal outcomes of identifiable groups. While the board talks about marginalized groups generally, it has clearly identified black people as the most marginalized, based on the lower academic achievement and higher rates of discipline associated with black (especially male) students. 

A thoughtful, holistic, comprehensive, and evidence-based review would have identified a range of complex and interconnected reasons, including racism, why black students underperform academically, and, yes, act in ways that trigger discipline, more frequently. Such a review would have acknowledged that the school board, alone, can do little to address these problems, and pointed to ways that it can act in concert with local and provincial government, social service agencies, community-based supports, and, I’m sure this will be very unpopular with the activists, law enforcement, to bring about positive change over time.

But that is not the review we got. The pre-ordained outcome was to declare anti-black racism to be the only reason black students are not flourishing. The actions taken by the board have been a reflection of this belief. So how effective have they been? 

PDSB review directive 9 requires senior administration to report on their progress:

Direction 9 – Implement an Annual Equity Report Card

The Board released its first Annual Equity Accountability Report Card in September 2021 which established a baseline of disproportionality measures along five main theme areas: Student Achievement, Programs and Pathways, Special Education, Student Discipline, and Student Well-Being. Additional report cards have been released: “Exploring the Equity Gap by Faith/Spirituality” (November 2021) and “Amplifying the Voices of African, Afro-Caribbean, and Black Students” (December 2021).

In March 2022, the board released “Understanding the Equity Gap in Special Education”. In July 2022, the ministry requested that the Board outline a specific process or timeline for using the equity report card to provide such measures, and to include expulsion for future analysis as per the minister’s direction. This work is currently underway.

In October 2022, the second Annual Equity Accountability Report Card was released. The report card provides trend data from 2018-19 to 2021-22 for a number of outcome indicators. Its purpose is to provide insights into the disproportionate experiences of Peel District School Board (PDSB) students over the last four years

The Objective of the Annual Equity Accountability Report Card 

“In accordance with Ministry Directive 9, this report includes the second Annual Equity Accountability Report Card. The report card provides trend data from 2018-19 to 2021-22 for a number of outcome indicators. Its purpose is to provide insights into the disproportionate experiences of Peel District School Board (PDSB) students over the last four school years”. 

Equity, the board’s main focus, demands that disproportionate experiences of PDSB students, presumably in terms of lower academic performance and higher rates of discipline among black students, be eliminated. But according to this objective, the report card exists to “provide insights…” on the data which shows that the board has not made any real progress at all in the last 2.5 years. Why?

Under “Student Achievement”, the report card attributes these continuing inequities by saying “the [racist] barriers are still pervasive, and that racism is an active factor”. Evidently the board’s “antiracist” approach, which is costing millions and diverting vast uncounted resources from other desperately needed areas, has been ineffective. 

The Summary of Findings of the Annual Equity Accountability Report Card 

“Academic Performance: Consistent over-representation of identities that have been traditionally marginalized. African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean, Indigenous, Latinx/Hispanic, Mixed Race and Middle Eastern students have not been granted credits at the expected pace to graduate within four years. This trend is consistent across grade levels and remains the same or increasing across years of study, suggesting that the barriers are still pervasive, and that racism is an active factor”. 

The phrasing “not been granted credits” is pure CT in that it places the onus on the school board to hand out credits, rather than affirm the expectation that students earn them. This presents these marginalized students as victims and removes their agency. No evidence is provided to suggest that hard-working students who earned credits have been unfairly refused them. That is because in the schools, credits are being handed out like candies. To pass all but the most demanding of senior level courses, a student needs do little more than show up and go through the motions.

Furthermore, South Asian, East Asian, and Jewish students, who have also traditionally been marginalized, are doing better than whites. This is conveniently left out. But the main point is that in spite of nearly three years of concerted “antiracism” policies, the very groups targeted by “equity” initiatives have not improved at all. So, the board has utterly failed to address the one thing it has been focused on at the expense of everything else.

To be fair, the report card does make mention of the impact of socioeconomic factors in academic achievement. This is a rare admission by the board, which usually considers any suggestion that something other than racism may be at play to be heresy, but even though these are aspects over which the board has limited or no control, the objective remains “equity” (equal outcomes between identity groups). This does not make sense.

Human Rights and Equity:  Suspensions are disproportionate for African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean and Indigenous students despite decrease in overall suspensions. While there is a reduction in the number of suspensions in 2021-22 compared to 2018-19, African, Black, and AfroCaribbean and Indigenous students continue to be more than two-times more likely to be suspended 

As always, the board does not talk about disproportionate rates of suspension-triggering behaviors among certain groups, but rather disproportionate rates of suspensions (consequences for suspension-triggering behavior). First off, let me make it clear that school administrators are under intense pressure not to suspend “marginalized” (black) kids, so the disproportionate rate of suspension-triggering behaviors is much higher than it appears. But the main point here is that the board needs strategies to address the suspension-triggering behaviors, yet it has none because it attributes the disproportionate rates of suspensions entirely to racism on the part of teachers and administrators. The unwillingness to suspend, or when suspensions are handed out, to enforce the terms of the suspensions, has created a “wild west” mentality among students prone to misbehave. Often suspended kids show up to school and just hang around with their friends who are skipping classes to be with them, even though the terms of the suspension include the requirement that students are not to be on school property during the suspension. Nothing is usually done to address this. 

Mental Health and Well-Being: Absenteeism is almost twice as high among some marginalized groups. African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean, Indigenous, Latinx/Hispanic and Middle Eastern students experience higher instances of absenteeism compared to other students, suggesting that schools may not be places where they feel safe and/or offer a sense of belonging. (Curry-Stevens & Kim-Gervey, 2016)

Question: What is the rate of absenteeism among low academic achieving kids from the identity groups above compared to the rate of absenteeism among low achieving students generally? Conversely, how do high achieving kids from those groups compare to the general group of high achievers in terms of absenteeism? Could it be that absenteeism is more a reflection of achievement in school than race? If so, the solution would be to design programs of study that reflect the lower level of knowledge and skill that these kids possess when they arrive at high school, moving them forward from a secure foundation. But rather than do that, the board is putting these kids in the same classes as the kids with a much higher level of knowledge and skills. How does that make kids feel a sense of belonging? Race optics trump student needs. 

Pathways and Transitions: Students who identify as Indigenous, African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean, and White are most likely to be identified with an exceptionality. African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean students are about four times more likely to be identified with a behavioral exceptionality and are one and a half to three times more likely to be identified with language impairment, learning disability and mild intellectual disability. Indigenous students are about four to five times more likely to be identified with the following exceptionalities – autism, language impairment and, learning disability; they are also two times more likely to be identified with a mild intellectual disability exceptionality.

Once again, the implication is that racism is the reason, in this case the motivation for labeling kids from certain groups as “exceptional” (this is a euphemism for previous terms such as “challenged” and is but one of dozens of edu-speak terms confusing matters for parents and the general public). This of course means that there will not be any investigation as to what the causes really are, no doubt a complex web of socioeconomic factors. Credit must be given to this casual passing admission that white kids, as a group, are not really doing all that well either. The fact is that academically, they are mid-pack, which is just more evidence that the board’s claims of a culture of “white supremacy” are absurd. 

With the discontinuation of Applied programming in Grade 9, a higher proportion of students are accessing Academic (de-streamed) programs which can lead to university level courses. However, reviewing the outcomes, we see that African, Black, and AfroCaribbean students, Indigenous, Latinx/Hispanic, those with a very high SVI and those with an IEP are still disproportionately streamed out of these opportunities.

No one was ever “streamed out” of anything in Ontario schools. No student can be refused any course selection they want as long as they have the prerequisites. This is not at all a case of teachers or administrators moving kids out of courses or programs they want and are qualified for, and that has never been the case. What is being said here is “we put a bunch of kids with below average academic ability into the same classes as kids with high academic ability and most of the lower functioning kids did not end up in university level courses in grade 11”. Is that a surprise? What is not mentioned is that, along the way, everyone got a degraded education. 

Afro-Caribbean students are overrepresented in sports programs which may stem from the harmful stereotype that associate Black children and youth with physical prowess and superior athletic abilities further eroding their access to academic success (James & Turner, 2017). Indigenous students are also severely underrepresented in all programs with the exception of the Arts and AP programs.

Even in instances where black students are engaged, it’s still bad news.

Despite, the boards’ self-identification process for regional learning choice programs that began in the 2020-2021 school year to address disproportionalities, there continues to be disproportionate involvement for African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean and Indigenous students. Unfortunately, the change in admissions process will likely take several years to be reflected in the data as the nature of RLCPs having one-time entry will mean that past inequities in admissions will persist in enrolment numbers. However, there is a slight increase in African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean students participating in the Arts programs.

“Learning choice programs” are set up for high academic achievers. If you look at a group of kids whose academic achievement is lower, of course you are going to see students from these groups are not applying for these high-level, very demanding programs proportionally. The board did not try to address the issue of lower academic achievement among black students, they simply allowed them, on the basis of minimum academic qualifications, to bypass the lottery by which all the other students are selected. This is in fact the second step towards equity with regard to these programs. Students used to have to apply, and admission criteria included academic achievement. The “best”, that is most meritorious, students were accepted. Then they moved to a lottery for anyone with basic qualifications. Even that did not pull in many black students so they have moved to automatic acceptance for them. Of course, there was never any evidence that the process was racist, but that does not stop the activists from celebrating this “removal of a racist barrier for black students”.

Impact Analysis

Risk Assessment: The Peel District School Board has been provided a strong mandate through the Ministry Review to address disproportionate outcomes for African, Black, and Afro-Caribbean, Indigenous and other students who have been historically marginalized. As stated in the Ministry Review, “The task for those leaders is to bend best efforts of our education systems into effective service for all” (p.36). As an organization, we must remain steadfastly focused on ensuring that all PDSB students can realize their full potential in classrooms and schools where they are supported, respected, valued, and welcomed (Chadha et al., 2020, p. 2). The students and families in Peel have a right to a high-quality education. As a Board we have a moral and ethical obligation to address and eliminate disproportionate outcomes for African, Black and Afro-Caribbean, Indigenous and other students who have been historically marginalized. 

The students and families in Peel do definitely have the right to a high-quality education, yet over the past 2-and-one-half years, and especially this year, schools have become more unruly and violent and learning has been degraded. While some of the blame for this is outside the scope of control of the board, e.g. the pandemic, the question that has to be asked is whether board policies and actions have made things better or worse, and the latter is clearly the case.

I will leave it to you to decide if the “next steps” and success criteria listed on the report card will in fact make schools a safer and more positive learning environment in which all students can thrive on their own academic terms, whether they be headed to the world of work, college, or university after high school. 

The belief that differing academic outcomes and higher rates of discipline are the result of teacher and administrator racism and “biases and structures rooted in white supremacy” has resulted in disastrous policies and actions from the PDSB, the devastating results of which we are just starting to see. 

Each student must be seen as an individual with individual needs and aspirations and treated as such. A one-size-fits-all approach, such as de-streaming, is the antithesis of this. There must be a culture of respect and order in the schools, resulting from clear behavioral expectations and proportional consequences for misbehavior. We must accept that although we want to be as inclusive as possible, not all students will be successful in academically oriented programs, and we need good, positive, and effective alternatives for all these students. 

The board, by convincing black students and parents that its administrators and teachers are racists who are creating barriers to black student achievement, has sown the wind, and we as a society are reaping the whirlwind. Many black parents no longer trust, support, or have confidence in teachers and administrators, even black ones. Can you blame them? If you were a black parent and your son was experiencing difficulties at school, given the climate the board has created, what would you think? We cannot blame the students or parents. It is our school board, and ultimately our provincial government, that has let them down. 

The current course on which the PDSB is headed leads to a cliff. The “anti-racists” will never be satisfied until every metric shows that every identity group is achieving the same outcome in every imaginable category. If that means everyone is worse off, they don’t mind. Is this the route we as a society want to go? The longer we wait to take action to stop this tsunami of idiocy, the harder and more expensive it will be to come back to rationality. 

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Thanks for reading. For more PDSB analysis from this author, read Critical Social Justice Ideology in Education

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