The Ford government is still “reviewing all of our options” when it comes to full-day kindergarten, says Ontario’s education minister amid growing speculation the province is looking to move away from the current staffing model of a teacher and early childhood educator.“As you know, there’s been work,” Lisa Thompson told reporters at Queen’s Park Monday. “There’s no stone unturned at this stage of the game. We are reviewing all of our options.”She also noted the government is not looking at any changes in classroom sizes from kindergarten to Grade 3 — as they are from Grades 4 through 12 — and “we look forward to working with our experts in the classroom.” Thompson, and Premier Doug Ford, have previously committed to keeping full-day learning as is for the coming school year after an outcry from parents when the government was not clear about the future of the popular program.Full-day was absent from Thompson’s big education announcement last week, though the education ministry has been consulting on various aspects of the program, which costs the province $1.5 billion a year.“People ask is full-day kindergarten safe? I say safe for a year maybe at most,” said NDP Education Critic Marit Stiles. “The government is definitely going to be reducing resources.”The government also recently polled voters on full-day kindergarten, asking about different staffing scenarios.Tom MacKay, a former teacher who now practises family law in Windsor, said an Ipsos pollster contacted him by phone on the evening of March 8 to answer a survey “on behalf of the government of Ontario.”(Ipsos Reid says it does not reveal clients or the nature of the polling they do.)MacKay said the poll lasted between 10 and 15 minutes — and the first question was a general open-ended query about the priorities he wanted to see addressed in his area.The second question was ...
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