BROKEN PROMISE

Liberals to break promise on classroom sizes
Jun 22 2005
CBC News

CBC NEWS – Ontario's Liberal government will break another high-profile election promise by scrapping a proposed 20-student cap on classroom sizes in primary grades, according to a Ministry of Education memo.

In a memo dated June 16, Naylor said up to 10 per cent of each board's primary classes would be allowed to have as many as 23 students.

"The purpose of flexibility is to ensure that boards and schools can achieve the cap in a way that maximizes the benefits for primary students," Naylor wrote in the memo.

That flexibility, she wrote, "will allow schools and boards to organize classes and schools that conform to provincial guidelines while responding to local circumstances and delivering quality education programs."

During the 2003 campaign that brought him to power, Premier Dalton McGuinty promised that no more than 20 students would be allowed in classes from kindergarten to grade three.

At the time, some school boards questioned the practicality of that promise. They estimated that the cost of limiting class sizes would far exceed their budgets and the number of classrooms available.

The commitment was even questioned by Education Minister Gerard Kennedy, who speculated shortly after the election that the cap might only apply to about 95 per cent of classrooms.

At the time, McGuinty publicly contracted his minister. "I don't remember 95 per cent," the premier said. "I'm very determined to have in place a real hard cap right around the province."

The government's decision to lift the classroom cap is the latest in a series of broken campaign promises that have dogged the Liberals since their 2003 election victory.

That list includes pledges to balance the budget during their first full year in office, to freeze taxes and to close all of the province's coal-burning power plants by 2007.

FROM NOV. 12, 2003: McGuinty stands firm on class-size cap