Schools failing to ‘consistently’ meet requirements of special needs students: Ontario AG

Special education programs in Ontario schools have not “consistently fulfilled the requirements of students,” the auditor general has found, in a report raising concerns about staff absences and undocumented exclusions.

In her special report, auditor general Shelley Spence found the growth of children with special education needs is outpacing enrolment and painted a picture of a poorly organized system struggling to keep pace.

Over the past decade, overall student enrolment has grown by four per cent — but the number of students with additional educational needs has grown by seven per cent.

“We consistently heard that student needs had become increasingly complex,” the report said.

“Without adequate staffing, this led to difficulty managing high-needs students in large classrooms and behavioural challenges. For EAs especially, it resulted in heightened stress, more frequent physical injuries and a corresponding high rate of absenteeism.”

Unaccommodated behavioural challenges and staffing issues contributed to classroom problems and increased absences, Spence found.

In 2023/24, almost one in five educational assistants was absent on any given day at the three boards reviewed. Between 49 and 72 per cent of the time, those absences were not filled by a qualified temporary staffer.

“Principals, teachers and EAs that we spoke with at all three school boards reported that the high level of EA absences was primarily due to the elevated stress and student-related physical injuries they experienced,” the report found.

Potentially compounding the problem was a lack of training for teachers to work with students with special education needs in their classrooms, or when EAs weren’t available.

Almost 60 per cent of teachers surveyed said they had received “no or minimal training on key special education topics, including identifying student needs, developing and implementing IEPs, assessing students, behaviour management, autism and learning disabilities.”

The report also revealed issues with regular, informal exclusions for students with special needs.

The auditor general said a lack of provincial guidelines on exclusions had left a patchwork of policies. One board reviewed had no guidelines, one had vague suggestions and the other had a comprehensive policy.

But 39 per cent of teachers surveyed said they’d seen informal and undocumented exclusions for students. Of those, 33 per cent said they had seen it more than five times in a single school year.

Those exclusions were predominantly related to behavioural challenges, safety concerns and a lack of support or resources.

The auditor found issues with the current assessments for students with special education needs.

Thirty-four per cent of students at the Toronto Catholic District School Board and the Peel District School Board had been waiting longer than a year for a special assessment.

At the Upper Canada District School Board, however, all students were seen within a year or less.

Issues with assessments appear to be reflected in the core numbers. While students with special educational needs grew by seven per cent over a decade, the number of additional needs discovered through a formal Identification, Placement and Review Committee stayed constant.

The auditor general noted that learning plans were applied inconsistently and “the implementation of supports outlined in them was neither monitored nor assured.”

Parents of children with special education needs, as well as government critics and advocates, have long argued special education is broken in the province, pointing primarily to funding as the key issue.

According to Spence, Ontario increased funding for special education by 15 per cent from $3.1 to $3.6 billion between 2019/20 and 2023/24.

“This is in line with 15 per cent inflation,” the auditor general found.

The government agreed with most of the auditors’ recommendations.

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