School Board Research sent the Minister of Education its findings on codes of conduct, bullying prevention and accessibility at all 72 school boards. Since 2012 the Minister has had the power to require boards to submit their conduct and bullying policies and to change them. The reply sets out no plan, no timeline and no monitoring.
Summary
Ontario’s Ministry of Education writes the rules school boards follow on student conduct and bullying, and the Education Act gives the Minister the power to require boards to comply. Since 2012 the Act has also let the Minister require boards to submit their conduct and bullying policies and to change them as directed. The public record shows that in 2010 the Auditor General was told no formal monitoring function existed. We found no public record that the Minister has used the 2012 power.
- On 15 October 2026 School Board Research sent the Minister of Education three letters reporting that no board met all the requirements tested under PPM 128, PPM 144 and the accessibility standards. Each asked the Minister to direct boards to comply within 30 days.
- The reply came from the Director of the Ministry’s Safe Schools Branch. It disputes no finding and does not answer the request. It states no plan, no timeline and no monitoring. Its one commitment is to keep the reports in mind when the memoranda are next amended.
- Four governments have written Ontario’s safe schools rules since 1994. The only memorandum we found that told boards to send their policies to the Ministry for review was issued in June 1994 under the New Democratic government. Its deadline fell four days into the next government’s term, and it was replaced in 2011. The power to require boards to submit their policies, added to the Education Act in 2012, has no record of use that we found.
- In 2010 the Auditor General of Ontario reported being told that neither the Ministry nor the boards it visited had a formal monitoring function, and recommended that the Ministry work with school boards to monitor compliance. In 2025 the Ministry’s Safe Schools Branch, whose published mandate is to develop policy and support its implementation, had eight positions held by people on the Ministry’s 2025 list of employees paid $100,000 or more, together paid $1,050,148, in a year of public service pay increases that included retroactive payments. None of the published descriptions we found says how the branch or the Ministry checks the codes of conduct and bullying documents boards publish.
1. Introduction
In October 2026 School Board Research published the results of three reviews of all 72 district school boards: codes of conduct, bullying prevention and intervention and accessibility documents. Board-by-board results are on the Board Report Card.
On 15 October 2026 the sector results, naming no board, went to the Minister of Education in three letters, and to the Minister for Seniors and Accessibility in a fourth. The letters are published in full. Each asked the Minister to direct all boards to bring their published documents into line within 30 days.
This article sets the Ministry of Education’s reply beside what the public record shows about how the Ministry checks that boards follow its rules. An earlier article followed one rule from the Ministry to the school door. This one asks who checks that it arrives.
2. What the Ministry Replied
The reply was received by email on 2 November 2026. It was addressed to School Board Research, answered the three letters to the Minister of Education together, and was signed by the Director, Safe Schools Branch, Indigenous Education and Well Being Division. Its text, with the recipient’s name removed, reads in full:
Thank you for sharing your findings on school boards’ implementation of Policy/Program Memorandums (PPMs) 128 and 144 as well as their published accessibility documents.
Please know the ministry takes your concerns seriously. We will keep your reports in mind as we amend PPMs going forward.
Thank you again for taking the time to write.
| The letters | The reply |
|---|---|
| Asked the Minister to direct all boards to comply within 30 days | Not addressed |
| Asked that each Director of Education attest once a year that the board’s documents meet each requirement | Not addressed |
| Reported findings on 72 boards | No finding disputed |
| Stated that boards will be reviewed again in mid-January 2027 | Not addressed |
| (No request on this point) | Commits to keeping the reports in mind when PPMs are amended |
The reply states no plan, no timeline, and no step by which the Ministry will check what boards publish, now or later. The findings concern boards not meeting the memoranda as they stand. Amending a memorandum later does not change what boards must publish now.
The Ministry’s public page on who is responsible for education places that duty on boards. It lists “ensuring schools abide by the Education Act and its regulations” among the responsibilities of school boards (Ontario 2026f). Section 4 sets out what the Act lets the Minister do.
3. Thirty-Two Years of Safe Schools Rules
Four governments have written Ontario’s safe schools rules since 1994. The only memorandum we found that told boards to send their policies to the Ministry for review was issued in 1994. It was replaced in 2011.
1990 to 1995: the New Democratic government of Bob Rae. On 1 June 1994 the Ministry of Education and Training issued PPM 120 and the Violence-Free Schools Policy, 1994. Boards had to adopt a violence-prevention policy. PPM 120 provided that boards “shall submit their violence-prevention policies and implementation plans to the appropriate regional office of the Ministry of Education and Training no later than June 30, 1995,” and that “The ministry will review the policies and plans” (Ontario 1994). A Violence Prevention Secretariat at Queen’s Park and the Ministry’s regional offices were named as contacts.
The submission deadline, 30 June 1995, fell four days after the Progressive Conservative government of Mike Harris was sworn in on 26 June 1995. We found no published record that the review was carried out, or of its results.
1995 to 2003: the Progressive Conservative governments of Mike Harris and Ernie Eves. The Safe Schools Act, 2000 added Part XIII to the Education Act, including section 301. The Ministry’s booklet Ontario Schools: Code of Conduct took effect as ministry policy on 1 September 2000. PPM 128, issued on 14 November 2000, told boards to develop codes of conduct and to review them: “reviews must be conducted at least every three years.” The reviewer was the board itself. PPM 128 set no step by which a board sent its code to the Ministry (Ontario 2000).
2003 to 2018: the Liberal governments of Dalton McGuinty and Kathleen Wynne. In December 2004 the Minister appointed a Safe Schools Action Team (Auditor General 2010, 274). In July 2005 the Ontario Human Rights Commission initiated a complaint alleging that the safe schools provisions and discipline policies were having a disproportionate impact on “racial minority students and students with disabilities.” In the settlement of 10 April 2007 the Ministry agreed that boards “will be directed to submit” their police and school board protocols to the Ministry, and that “The Ministry will report on this review to the Commission” (Ontario Human Rights Commission 2007).
The same years brought new rules for boards: the first PPM 144 on bullying prevention (4 October 2007, policies required by 1 February 2008; Ontario 2007), the Progressive Discipline and School Safety amendments (assented 4 June 2007), the Keeping Our Kids Safe at School amendments (assented 5 June 2009), and the Accepting Schools Act, 2012 (passed 5 June 2012). The Ministry reissued PPM 128 and PPM 144 on 5 December 2012 (Ontario 2012a; Ontario 2012b). In the versions of PPM 128 and PPM 144 we read from these years, no step asks boards to send their policies to the Ministry.
On 16 May 2011 a new PPM 120 replaced the 1994 memorandum “and revokes the document Violence-Free Schools Policy, 1994” (Ontario 2011). The new version asks boards to report the total number of violent incidents to the Ministry each year, and to collect and analyse data on the nature of violent incidents themselves.
2018 to the present: the Progressive Conservative government of Doug Ford. The Ministry reissued PPM 128 on 29 August 2019 and 27 June 2024, and PPM 144 on 25 November 2021. The Ministry edited PPM 144 on 15 July 2026 without changing its date of issue. On 7 May 2026 the province repealed the requirement that boards conduct school climate surveys, together with the Minister’s power, held since 2012, to establish policies and guidelines respecting them (School Board Research 2026e). The current PPM 128 and PPM 144 set no step by which boards send their codes or plans to the Ministry.
| Government | Rules for boards | Ministry check on board policies |
|---|---|---|
| New Democratic, 1990 to 1995 | Violence-prevention policy (PPM 120, 1994) | Boards submit policies; “The ministry will review the policies and plans”. Deadline fell under the next government |
| Progressive Conservative, 1995 to 2003 | Code of conduct (Safe Schools Act, 2000; PPM 128, 2000) | None stated. Boards review their own codes at least every three years |
| Liberal, 2003 to 2018 | Bullying policies (PPM 144, 2007); progressive discipline; Accepting Schools Act | Boards to be directed to submit police protocols for review (2007 human rights settlement). 1994 review step dropped when PPM 120 was replaced (2011); incident counts reported instead |
| Progressive Conservative, 2018 to present | PPM 128 (2019, 2024); PPM 144 (2021, edited 2026) | None stated |
4. The Minister Holds the Power
The two education memoranda are the Minister’s own policies, and the Education Act lets the Minister require boards to follow them.
- Subsection 301 (1): “The Minister may establish a code of conduct governing the behaviour of all persons in schools.” PPM 128 is made under this subsection (Ontario 2024a).
- Subsection 301 (4): “The code of conduct is a policy of the Minister.”
- Subsection 301 (7.1): “The Minister shall establish policies and guidelines with respect to bullying prevention and intervention in schools”. PPM 144 sets out those policies and guidelines.
- Subsection 301 (9), headed “Duty of boards”: “The Minister may require boards to comply with policies and guidelines established under this section.”
- Subsection 301 (11), headed “Approval and changes, board policies and guidelines”: “The Minister may require boards to submit any policy or guideline established under section 302 to the Minister and to implement changes to the policy or guideline as directed by the Minister.” Boards establish their conduct policies under subsection 302 (1) and their bullying prevention and intervention policies under subsection 302 (3.4). The Accepting Schools Act, 2012 added this power.
Neither PPM 128 (2024) nor PPM 144 (2021) sets out any step by which boards report their documents to the Ministry, or by which the Ministry reviews them. The Minister does not need one. Under subsection 301 (11) the Minister can require any board to submit these policies at any time, and to change them as directed. We found no public record that any Minister has used this power since it was added in 2012.
The Legislature considered a stronger rule the same year. Bill 14, the Anti-Bullying Act, 2012, a private member’s bill from the Progressive Conservative opposition, would have provided that “Every board shall establish a bullying prevention plan for bullying in schools within the board’s jurisdiction and submit it to the Minister for approval,” and that a plan “has no effect until the Minister, by order, approves it” (Legislative Assembly of Ontario 2012). It passed second reading on 29 March 2012 and was referred to committee. The government’s Bill 13, the Accepting Schools Act, 2012, became law instead, with the power in subsection 301 (11).
Parents and legislators raised this before. In 2010, parents’ groups in London and York Region, representing more than 400 families, called for an ombudsman to end what they called the “‘ping-pong’ method of accountability”, in which parents are sent from teacher to principal to superintendent to trustee (Kaye 2010). A member of the London Anti-Bullying Coalition told a reporter that year: “No one seems to know who is responsible” (Zarzour 2010). On 21 July 2014 an MPP asked the Minister of Education in the House: “What process does your ministry follow to ensure school boards comply with anti-bullying legislation, how do you keep school administrators accountable, and why has this process failed in my riding?” The Minister replied that “Not every incident turns out to be managed 100% perfectly,” and later that “it is in fact the local trustees who are accountable for ensuring that this legislation is put into place” (Legislative Assembly of Ontario 2014). Subsection 301 (11) had been in the Act since 2012.
The Ministry also describes its own enforcement tools. Its page on financial accountability in the education system says there are measures it can take “to ensure a school board is complying with all” the “laws we administer” and the “regulations, policies, guidelines, directives and similar instruments made under these laws.” The measures include directing a board to submit a formal action plan, withholding all or part of a grant, and an external investigation. The page also says that the Supporting Children and Students Act, 2025 gave the minister “more authority to oversee, direct and intervene in school board financial, governance and program performance” (Ontario 2026g).
In 2026 the Legislature went further. The Putting Student Achievement First Act, 2026 (Bill 101), which received Royal Assent on 7 May 2026, renamed directors of education as chief executive officers and expanded the Minister’s powers over board budgets, land and communications. It also repealed the Minister’s power to set policies and guidelines for school climate surveys (School Board Research 2026e). Subsection 301 (11) remains in the Act, in the wording added in 2012, as read on e-Laws on 2 November 2026.
The power to require and correct board policies exists, and so do the tools to enforce them. The 2026 reply mentions neither.
The only memorandum we found that told boards to send their policies to the Ministry, PPM 120 of 1994, is described in section 3. It was replaced in 2011.
5. What the Auditor General Found
The Auditor General of Ontario has reported on school safety, or parts of it, in 2010, 2012, 2018, 2020 and 2024. Several of these reports found gaps in how the rules were tracked.
2010. The audit set out to assess whether the Ministry and selected boards had adequate procedures to “ensure compliance with school safety legislation and policy requirements” (Auditor General 2010, 273). It reported: “We were informed that neither the Ministry nor the school boards we visited have established a formal monitoring function to ensure compliance with school safety requirements” (280). Some board and school policies “had not been updated” (280). Recommendation 2 asked the Ministry to work with boards to “monitor compliance with required school safety legislation and ministry policies” (281).
2012. In the follow-up, the Ministry told the Auditor General that it “monitors compliance by analyzing data to assess board activities and how funds were spent to support school safety,” and that it “expects that boards will continue to improve their practices over time” (Auditor General 2012, 403). It also reported that in 2010/11 it began distributing $5 million annually to fund “a regionally based school board audit function to help ensure compliance with school safety legislation, policies and initiatives” (403).
2018 and 2020. A 2018 audit recommended that the Ministry “track and measure the incidence of cyberbullying in Ontario schools” (Auditor General 2020, 189). Two years later the Auditor General rated the Ministry’s progress “Little or no progress” (189).
2024. An audit of the Toronto District School Board, the province’s largest, found that the board “Is Centrally Tracking Only Some of the Bullying Its Students Are Experiencing” (Auditor General 2024, s. 4.1.3).
In 2012 the Ministry said it “expects that boards will continue to improve their practices over time.” In 2026 it said it will keep the reports “in mind as we amend PPMs going forward.” Neither statement, and nothing in the 2012 follow-up, describes a check on the codes of conduct or bullying documents boards publish.
6. What the Ministry Counts, and What It Leaves to Boards
The Ministry collects numbers about incidents. The checking of policies is left to the boards that write them.
- Violent incidents. Under PPM 120 (2011), “Boards are required to report the total number of violent incidents on an annual basis to the Ministry of Education through the Ontario School Information System (OnSIS).” Under the heading “Ongoing monitoring by boards”, boards are “required to collect and analyse data on the nature of violent incidents to support the development of board policies” (Ontario 2011).
- Suspensions and expulsions. In the 2007 human rights settlement the Ministry agreed “to make suspension and expulsion data available (by Board) on its website on a regular basis” (Ontario Human Rights Commission 2007).
- Funding. In March 2006 the Deputy Minister told boards that bullying prevention funding would be provided at “$1,500 per elementary school, $2,000 per secondary school,” under transfer payment agreements (Ministry of Education 2006). The Auditor General’s 2012 follow-up describes $5 million a year to fund “a regionally based school board audit function to help ensure compliance with school safety legislation, policies and initiatives” (403).
- School climate surveys. From 2012 the Minister held the power to establish policies and guidelines for school climate surveys. No provincial instrument was ever issued, and on 7 May 2026 the power and the board requirement were repealed (School Board Research 2026e).
- Board policies. PPM 128 and PPM 144 tell boards to review their own codes, policies and plans. Neither sets a step by which the Ministry sees them. Other memoranda set steps by which boards report to, or are checked by, the Ministry. Under PPM 150 (2010) boards were “required to attest that they will be in full compliance” (Ontario 2010). Under PPM 141 (2012) boards “will also allow monitoring visits by the ministry, as required” (Ontario 2012c). Under PPM 169 (2024) “School boards are required to annually report to the Ministry of Education on their activities to achieve the requirements outlined in this memorandum” (Ontario 2024b).
Steps of this kind appear, in a lighter form, in a safe schools memorandum issued in the same year as the current PPM 144. PPM 166, issued on 6 July 2021 and in effect from 31 January 2022, directs boards to establish and follow an anti-sex trafficking protocol. Under the heading “Measuring success: accountability and evaluation”, it states that “During the first year of implementation, the Ministry of Education will provide support for the review of the school board’s anti-sex trafficking protocol and offer advice and suggestions, as requested by individual boards”, and that “Following the first year, school boards may be required to report to the Ministry of Education, upon the ministry’s request, on their activities to achieve the expectations outlined in this policy framework” (Ontario 2021a). The Ministry then funded the Council of Ontario Directors of Education to support boards in meeting the memorandum. The Council’s final report records a survey “sent to boards at request of Ministry of Education” in February 2022, a meeting with the Ministry on its results in March, and the finding that “Less than 50 % had been able to complete their protocol by the required date” (Council of Ontario Directors of Education 2022, 1 to 4). In 2025 the province stated that “all Ontario school boards have established protocols to protect students from trafficking” (Ontario 2025b).
PPM 144 has no such section. Its “Monitoring and review” section is addressed to boards: “School boards must monitor, review and evaluate the effectiveness of board policies and guidelines” (Ontario 2021b). It sets no step by which the Ministry itself reviews a board’s bullying prevention plan, asks a board to report on it, or learns whether the plan has been written; the board is required to make the plan public on its website.
The Ministry counts incidents, agreed to publish suspension figures, and funds programs. It has written attestation, reporting and monitoring visits into other memoranda, and in 2022 it had boards surveyed on whether their anti-sex trafficking protocols were complete. In the public record we found, it has never asked boards to send it the codes of conduct or bullying plans it requires them to write, although the Act has allowed it since 2012.
7. What the Branch Is Set Up to Do
The Ministry’s safe schools office has changed shape and name several times. In 1994 PPM 120 named a Violence Prevention Secretariat. In March 2006 the Deputy Minister announced an interim Safe Schools Implementation Co-ordinator to give boards “one-stop access to the Ministry” (Ministry of Education 2006). In 2010 the Auditor General described a Safe Schools Unit that “holds the primary responsibility for school safety within the Ministry” (Auditor General 2010, 273). The Ministry’s published organization charts list a Safe Schools and Student Well-Being Branch in 2016-17 and a Safe & Healthy Schools Branch from 2017-18, with an acting director in 2017-18 and 2020-21. The current director appears on the charts from 2021-22, and on the salary list as Director, Safe and Healthy Schools Branch, from 2020. In 2025-26 it became the Safe Schools Branch (Ministry of Education 2016, 2017, 2020, 2021, 2024, 2025; Treasury Board Secretariat 2020 to 2026).
In 1994 the same memorandum that named the Secretariat had the Ministry review board policies. None of the later descriptions we found mentions such a review.
The Ministry’s public directory, INFO-GO, describes the Safe Schools Branch this way: “The Safe Schools Branch (SSB) develops and supports implementation of policies and programs that support safe school environments and that build positive school climates for all students across Ontario.” The branch reports to the Indigenous Education and Well-Being Division (Ontario 2026a).
The directory lists two units under the branch:
- The Policy and Research Unit “is responsible for providing advice, policy research and analysis to support the development of strategic priorities to promote school and student safety, and violence prevention” (Ontario 2026b).
- The Programs and Partnerships Development Unit “fosters partnerships and develops, implements, and oversees programs and initiatives that support and enable safe student behaviours, academic achievement, and future success” (Ontario 2026c).
Neither description mentions reviewing what boards publish, or measuring whether the rules the branch helps write are followed at the 72 boards. We found no public report, from the branch or the Ministry, that does either.
The Ministry does employ people to check compliance. A 2022 education officer posting listed the duty to “ensure compliance with ministry policies and programs” (Ontario Public Service 2022). We found no published record showing whether any education officer has reviewed a board’s code of conduct or bullying plan against PPM 128 or PPM 144.
8. Who Holds These Posts, and What They Are Paid
Ontario publishes each year the names, positions and salaries of public sector employees paid $100,000 or more in the calendar year (Treasury Board Secretariat 2020 to 2026). The Ministry’s directory lists the positions in the Safe Schools Branch and above it (Ontario 2026a to 2026e). Figure 2 sets the two side by side. Names are removed; the positions and amounts are public.
- In 2025 the Ministry of Education had 756 employees on the list.
- The Deputy Minister was paid $367,633, the Assistant Deputy Minister for the Indigenous Education and Well-Being Division $252,236, and the Director of the Safe Schools Branch $218,230.
- The directory lists 19 positions in the branch: the Director, an executive assistant and 17 positions in two units, one of them vacant. Eight were held by people on the Ministry of Education’s 2025 list, and those eight were paid $1,050,148 together.
- As of 2 November 2026, the Minister had been in post since March 2025, the Deputy Minister since September 2024, the Assistant Deputy Minister since 2023 and the Director since 2020, about six years (Legislative Assembly of Ontario 2026; Ontario 2026h; Treasury Board Secretariat 2020 to 2026). The manager of the Policy and Research Unit has been on the salary list as manager since 2022.
Pay rose across the Ontario Public Service in 2025. Among the 381 ministry employees titled Director on both the 2024 and 2025 lists, the median increase was 31 per cent. The President of the Treasury Board attributed salary increases in 2025 to “retroactive payments, collective bargaining outcomes and an additional pay period” (CP24 2026). The list does not say how much of any one salary was retroactive.
These positions carry the Ministry’s published mandate for safe schools policy: to develop it and to support its implementation. In the public record we found, none of them, and no position above them, is described as checking whether the codes of conduct and bullying plans the 72 boards publish meet the Minister’s memoranda.
9. Why a Parent Would Care
The code of conduct and the bullying prevention plan are the documents a parent turns to when a child is hurt at school. They say what behaviour is not allowed, how to report it, who responds, and what happens next. The 2026 reviews found that no board’s code of conduct names a role and a method for reporting, and that only five boards’ bullying documents say where a parent reports and with whom (School Board Research 2026c).
Since 2012 the Minister has had the power to require boards to send these documents to the Ministry and to change them as directed. The Auditor General recommended in 2010 that the Ministry work with school boards to monitor compliance. In 2026 the Ministry was given the results for all 72 boards and committed to no step that would change what a parent finds on a board’s website. Nothing in the branch’s published mandate, or in the reply, describes a check on what boards publish.
10. Conclusion: Ask Your MPP
The Minister of Education answers to the Legislature, and every Member of Provincial Parliament can ask the Minister in writing or in the House. Some MPPs also sit on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, which reviews the Auditor General’s reports and the Ministry’s responses to them.
Parents have standing to ask. In 2024-25 Ontario’s publicly funded schools taught 2,095,193 students in 4,861 schools, with 145,522 full-time equivalent educator positions (Ontario 2025a). Families whose children attend private schools or are home-schooled are not counted in those figures. Parents far outnumber the system’s 145,522 educators.
- Find your MPP with the Legislative Assembly’s Find an MPP tool, using your street address and postal code. Ask whether the Minister will require boards to comply with PPM 128 and PPM 144 as written, who in the Ministry checks that they have, and whether any Minister has used subsection 301 (11) of the Education Act to require boards to submit their conduct or bullying policies.
- Ask your MPP to raise the Auditor General’s 2010 recommendation on monitoring compliance with the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.
- Look up your board on the Board Report Card, and tell us what you find at your own board through the public report form. Boards can respond through the board response form.
- Write to your trustees at any time. You do not need the school’s permission.
- If a complaint about a board’s administration is not resolved, contact the Ontario Ombudsman.
For how parents have changed provincial policy before, see Outside the Room and The Parent Playbook.
The boards will be reviewed again in mid-January 2027, and the results will be published beside the 2026 figures.
Annex: Data, Method and Limitations
The Ministry’s reply is quoted in full as received; only the recipient’s name is removed. The subsections of the Education Act cited, including 301 (11), 302 (1) and 302 (3.4), were read in the consolidated text on e-Laws on 2 November 2026. That we found no public record of the use of subsection 301 (11) rests on searches of Ministry publications, the Legislative Assembly’s website and Auditor General reports; it does not rule out use that was not published. The Auditor General’s reports were read in the PDFs published by the Office of the Auditor General of Ontario, and page numbers are the printed page numbers. PPM 120 (1994) was read in the Wayback Machine capture of the Ministry’s page of 14 August 2004. The Ministry directory entries and job postings were read on the live pages on 2 November 2026.
Figure 2 and section 8 use the positions listed in INFO-GO on 2 November 2026; the branch and unit pages were last updated in May 2025. Salaries are from the Public Sector Salary Disclosure for 2019 to 2025, matched to the directory by name and employer, and rounded to the dollar, so the amounts shown may not add exactly to the total, which is the sum of the unrounded salaries; names are not published here. The salary list gives a different job title for most of the staff matched; Figure 2 uses the directory title. On the 2022 to 2024 lists the Director’s post is titled Director, Safe and Healthy Schools Branch. A person listed in the directory who does not appear on the Ministry of Education’s 2025 list may have been paid less than $100,000, may have been paid by another ministry, or may not have held the position for all of 2025, and the directory pages may be out of date; at least one person the branch directory lists appears on the 2025 list under another ministry. The count of eight and the total of $1,050,148 therefore describe the people the directory lists who appear on the Ministry of Education’s 2025 list, not every salary paid for the branch’s work. Disclosed salary is the amount paid in the calendar year and can include retroactive pay. Time in post is as of 2 November 2026. For the Minister it is the date of appointment shown by the Legislative Assembly, and for the Deputy Minister the date shown on the Secretary of the Cabinet’s page. For the other posts it is the first calendar year in which the person appears on the salary list with that title; a person paid less than $100,000 in earlier years is not listed, so may have held the title longer, and a first appearance does not show the month a person took the post. The Director’s title appears on the 2020 list; on the 2018 and 2019 lists the same person is listed at another ministry. The median increase for directors compares the same person, with a title beginning “Director,” at the same ministry in both years, across all Ontario ministries.
This article reports what public documents say. It does not show what the Ministry does internally that it has not published, and a reply letter is not a full statement of the Ministry’s work. The 2026 review results are research findings about documents published on board websites, read against a written method, available on request.
References
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Ontario. 2010. Policy/Program Memorandum 150: School Food and Beverage Policy. 4 October 2010. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-150
Ontario. 2011. Policy/Program Memorandum 120: Reporting Violent Incidents to the Ministry of Education. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-120
Ontario. 2012a. Policy/Program Memorandum No. 128: The Provincial Code of Conduct and School Board Codes of Conduct. 5 December 2012. Copy posted by the Toronto District School Board. https://schoolweb.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/johnrossrobertson/docs/Provincial%20Code%20of%20Conduct%20128.pdf
Ontario. 2012b. Policy/Program Memorandum No. 144: Bullying Prevention and Intervention. 5 December 2012. Copy posted by the Nipissing-Parry Sound Catholic District School Board. https://olf.npsc.ca/UserFiles/Servers/Server_14450056/File/Safe%20Schools/Code%20of%20Conduct/144.pdf
Ontario. 2012c. Policy/Program Memorandum 141: School Board Program for Students on Long-Term Suspension. 5 December 2012. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-141
Ontario. 2021a. Policy/Program Memorandum 166: Keeping Students Safe: Policy Framework for School Board Anti-Sex Trafficking Protocols. 6 July 2021. Read 3 November 2026. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-166
Ontario. 2021b, updated 15 July 2026. Policy/Program Memorandum 144: Bullying Prevention and Intervention. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-144
Ontario. 2024a. Policy/Program Memorandum 128: The Provincial Code of Conduct and School Board Codes of Conduct. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-128
Ontario. 2024b. Policy/Program Memorandum 169: Student Mental Health. 17 June 2024. https://www.ontario.ca/document/education-ontario-policy-and-program-direction/policyprogram-memorandum-169
Ontario. 2025a. “Education Facts, 2024-2025.” https://www.ontario.ca/page/education-facts
Ontario. 2025b. “Ontario’s Anti-Human Trafficking Strategy 2025–2030.” Published 1 May 2025, updated 26 March 2026. Read 3 November 2026. https://www.ontario.ca/page/ontarios-anti-human-trafficking-strategy-2025-2030
Ontario. 2026a. “Safe Schools Branch.” INFO-GO, Government of Ontario Employee and Organization Directory. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.infogo.gov.on.ca/org?id=663
Ontario. 2026b. “Policy and Research Unit.” INFO-GO. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.infogo.gov.on.ca/org?id=4322
Ontario. 2026c. “Programs and Partnerships Development Unit.” INFO-GO. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.infogo.gov.on.ca/org?id=3605
Ontario. 2026d. “Indigenous Education and Well-Being Division.” INFO-GO. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.infogo.gov.on.ca/org?id=3785
Ontario. 2026e. “Deputy Minister’s Office.” INFO-GO. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.infogo.gov.on.ca/org?id=651
Ontario. 2026f. “Responsibility for Publicly Funded Elementary and Secondary Education.” Updated 17 June 2026. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.ontario.ca/page/responsibility-publicly-funded-elementary-and-secondary-education
Ontario. 2026g. “Financial Accountability in the Education System.” Updated 28 September 2026. Read 2 November 2026. https://www.ontario.ca/page/financial-accountability-education-system
Ontario. 2026h. “Meet the Secretary’s Team.” Updated 8 October 2026. Read 3 November 2026. https://www.ontario.ca/page/meet-secretarys-team
Ontario Human Rights Commission. 2007. “Human Rights Settlement Reached with Ministry of Education on Safe Schools: Terms of Settlement.” 10 April 2007. https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/human-rights-settlement-reached-ministry-education-safe-schools-terms-settlement
Ontario Public Service. 2022. “Education Officer, Job ID 180715.” https://www.gojobs.gov.on.ca/Preview.aspx?Language=English&JobID=180715
Safe Schools Act, 2000, S.O. 2000, c. 12. https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/S00012
School Board Research. 2026a. “The 2026 Results Are Public: What We Found at 72 School Boards, and What We Wrote to Two Ministers.” https://schoolboardresearch.ca/2026/10/15/2026-school-board-results/
School Board Research. 2026b. “One Rule, 72 Boards, 4,861 Schools: How a Ministry Policy Reaches the Classroom.” https://schoolboardresearch.ca/2026/10/24/one-rule-72-boards-4861-schools-how-a-ministry-policy-reaches-the-classroom/
School Board Research. 2026c. “Promised to Parents, Not Provided: Reporting Paths, Contacts and Communication at 72 School Boards.” https://schoolboardresearch.ca/2026/10/22/promised-to-parents-not-provided/
School Board Research. 2026d. Board Report Card. https://schoolboardresearch.ca/board-report-card/
School Board Research. 2026e. “What Happened to Ontario’s School Climate Surveys.” https://schoolboardresearch.ca/2026/10/06/what-happened-to-ontarios-school-climate-surveys/
Treasury Board Secretariat. 2020 to 2026. Public Sector Salary Disclosure, all sectors and seconded employees, calendar years 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025. Read 2 and 3 November 2026.
Zarzour, Kim. 2010. “Region Parents Worry about Anti-Bullying Watchdogs.” 3 August 2010. Reposted on the website of Peter Shurman, then MPP for Thornhill; the original publication is not named there. https://pet.ecclesiact.com/2010/08/03/school-boards-subject-to-certain-rules-of-engagement-shurman-notes
Legal disclaimer. School Board Research is not a law firm, its researchers are not lawyers, and nothing in this article is legal advice. The results are research findings about documents published on board websites, read against a written method, available on request, on the dates stated. They are not findings that any board has contravened the Education Act, Policy/Program Memorandum 128, Policy/Program Memorandum 144, the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2005, the Integrated Accessibility Standards or any other law; only a regulator, the Ministry or a court can make that finding. A reader who needs advice about their own situation should consult a lawyer.
School Board Research publishes independent analysis of Ontario school board data and policy. We are not lawyers, and nothing in this publication is legal advice. If you identify an error, please write to info@schoolboardresearch.ca. Corrections are noted on the page where they are made.