Two new studies show that children born just before kindergarten age cut-off dates are more likely to be diagnosed with attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
With kindergarteners set to pass a full day in the classroom, schools are going to need a little more room, and the Ontario government will be pumping millions of dollars into school additions and renovations to make sure they get it.
Over two years, $245-million will be distributed to school boards across the province in preparation for the next rollout phases of full-day kindergarten. This is beyond the McGuinty government's initial commitment of $200-million for the first year, and $300-million for the second year of the rollout, and as part of a cost-cutting provincial budget that included a public-sector wage freeze.
The money will help build an estimated 750 classrooms, which will be ready to accommodate about 20,000 students by the fall of 2012, said Education Minister Leona Dombrowsky, who made the announcement at Thorn Lodge Public School in Mississauga, which will offer full-day kindergarten next year.
Michelle Despault, a spokeswoman for the minister, said the $245-million figure was reached based on an estimated cost of $12,500 a student.
"Individual projects will cost more or less depending on whether the project is a renovation or an addition," she said. "We estimate that it will fund approximately 750 classrooms or almost 20,000 pupil places. This estimate takes into account that in addition to classroom spaces, there will also be need for other spaces to help accommodate the additional students in the school, for example, hallways, bathrooms, expanded office spaces may also be needed and are factored into our estimates."
Also factored in are varying materials, labour and construction costs across the province, she said.
The program will see full-day kindergarten programs and affordable after-school care made available in every school in the province gradually, over five years, and will be launched this fall in 600 schools for nearly 35,000 students. The second phase, for the fall of 2011, will roll out the program to 15,000 more students.
Critics of the program have lamented its hefty price tag. The $500-million committed previously by Premier Dalton McGuinty will go toward operations costs and salaries, while the additional millions announced Tuesday will go toward building classrooms for the 2011 rollout, and getting a jump start on facilities for the 2012 phase.
Conservative education critic Elizabeth Witmer said the rising price tag of the program, $745-million so far, should make taxpayers nervous.
"The costs are simply going to soar for this program and it's going to go well beyond what they [the McGuinty government]initially told the public," she said.
Ms. Witmer said the first few years of the program are likely to be the least expensive, as the program expands to schools that need more extensive renovations and changes to accommodate the full-day program.
The full-day learning program is based on a model put forward last spring by former deputy education minister Charles Pascal that would pair teachers with early-childhood educators in the classroom throughout the school day, and provide extended hour programs to parents for a small fee.
Critics such as the Institute of Marriage and Family Canada have said the program will be too costly for a province in the red, and that the real cost of full-day kindergarten will double initial estimates, reaching $1.8-billion annually.
The province is in the process of identifying which schools will be part of phase two of the rollout.
This fall, 101 Toronto schools will offer the program, with schools in the poorest neighbourhoods and those already equipped with adequate facilities given priority.
"This much-needed funding will help us bring full-day learning to more children in the Peel region," said Janet McDougald, chair of the Peel District School Board, which will see 36 schools offering the full-day program this fall. "We look forward to creating new learning spaces and implementing this exciting program."
With a report from Karen Howlett