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The Toronto District School Board will cut 40 vice-principal positions for the upcoming academic year in a move that will see some schools having to share a vice-principal, it says.
Ryan Bird, spokesperson for the board, said in an email Wednesday that 28 positions will be lost due to the end of one-time pandemic funding that the board had continue to provide in recent years, while 12 positions will be cut due to declining enrolment.
Bird said the board, now under provincial supervision, goes through a process every spring to determine how staff are placed in schools starting in September.
“This planning helps ensure that every school has the staff required to support the needs of students,” Bird said in the email.
With smaller schools, Bird said, the board is moving toward having vice-principals responsible for two schools, a model he said “has successfully been implemented at other school boards.”
“In some cases, combined Vice Principal teaching positions may still be required. It’s important to note that the vast majority — if not all — of these changes will be attained through attrition.”
TDSB put under provincial supervision last June
Last June, the Ontario government took control of the board, appointing Rohit Gupta as its supervisor.
The board said in a news release following the appointment that the powers of school board trustees are now vested in Ontario Education Minister Paul Calandra.
When Calandra took over the TDSB, he said he did so for financial reasons.
The province alleged the board had rejected nearly half of the cost-saving measures that management had recommended over the previous two years and the board relied had heavily on proceeds from asset sales to balance its books.