Students with special needs are not getting the education that they deserve from the Greater Essex County District School Board because of on-going staff shortages, according to a letter sent by the chair of the board of trustees to Ontario’s education minister.
Chair Gale Hatfield said that the board is recruiting university and college students in related fields to work as emergency replacements for the 50 to 100 educational support staff that the board is short each day,
Hatfield, in a letter sent to the Minister Stephen Lecce last month, described the situation as a crisis and called for urgent action to address the board’s most substantial concern: financial compensation for support staff.
“It’s not that we don’t want to hire, they’re just not there,” said Hatfield, who added that the board needs staff like Early Childhood Educators, Educational Assistants, Child and Youth Workers and Developmental Service Workers to work with students who have special needs.