"Let Schools Be Schools"

"We discovered a system that has replaced reading, writing and arithmetic with politicized content, union-driven equity agendas and identity-based labelling."

"When we hear the world equity, we think it means equality. But it doesn't. Equity is defined this way in school board policies as guaranteed outcomes -- not guaranteed opportunity."

"[Ontario school board trustees, teachers and parents are] muzzled [because code of conduct policies are] weaponized [against them]."

"They are actually precluded from speaking publicly about any concerns in the system and precluded from speaking privately with parents who come to them."

Tamara Gottlieb, co-founder, Jewish Educators and Families Association of Canada (JEFA) 

Tamara Gottlieb, co-founder of Jewish Educators and Families Association of Canada, presents a plan to address antisemitism in Ontario schools at a Toronto press conference on Aug. 11, 2025. (Photo by Mitch Consky)

 

"Discrimination and racism in all its forms have no place in our classrooms."

"Parents expect schools to keep divisive politics out of the classroom and instead focus on what matters most: teaching students reading, writing, and math skills to prepare them for good-paying jobs and lifelong success."

Education Minister Paul Calandra's spokesperson, Justine Teplycky  

Last month a survey commissioned by the Office of the Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism in Canada concluded that students in Ontario were targeted by antisemitic incidents in the hundreds. A follow-up report was released on Monday by Jewish Educators and Families Association of Canada, and in introducing that report the group's Tamara Gottlieb stated the obvious: Ontario's education system has mislaid its academic purpose, absent morals, but that this is not "only a Jewish concern." 

 

Policies that have gravitated through the Ontario education system to make Jewish students feel unsafe have created a troubling environment as well for other minority groups: Hindu, and Asian students, and Christian students as well, pointed out Ms. Gottlieb. The Toronto District School Board human rights department as an example, trains staff on "who qualifies as an oppressor", and in so doing, singles out Christians. The TDSB's own multi-year strategic plan assigns equity as its "guiding principle".

 

Entitled End the Crisis in Education: A Plan for Equal Rights and Real Learning, the JEFA report identifies antisemitism as a "flashing warning sign" of the education system's dysfunction, where antisemitism is being tolerated, not merely occurring haphazardly throughout Ontario schools. Over time this type of conduct has become "increasingly centralized and bureaucratic". Governance qualifications for school board leadership should be a requirement, the report ventures.

 

An example Gottlieb offers was that of a Grade 6 teacher at the Toronto District School Board -- the largest in Canada, one of 72 in the province  -- who arrived at class immediately following October 7's Palestinian Hamas atrocities in Israel, wearing a kaffiyeh. Students in his class were shown videos from Al Jazeera - a publication with close ties to Hamas, about the Nakba (Palestinian 'disaster' in the creation of the State of Israel) to be included in mandatory Holocaust education.  A Free Palestine poster with a QR code to donate funds to an "ambiguous charity" was set up in the classroom.

 

JEFA's Gottlieb pointed out the necessity for the province to step in to enforce rules affecting thousands of students; to clarify the ambiguity surrounding what constitutes a religious or political garment, where teachers wearing kaffiyehs at school are a point of contention among anti-Israel groups and the Canadian Jewish community.  

"[Kaffiyehs are now considered by many a symbol associated with the annihilation of a people."

"[They have been] codified [as cultural attire] with zero historical basis."

"The [provincial education minister Paul Calandra] has to step in and unify these policies so that your kid has the same rights in one board than [sic] they will in another board."

Tamara Gottlieb  

Teachers, the JEFA report recommends, should be licensed directly by the Ministry of Education, replacing the current model where teachers are licensed by the Ontario College of Teachers (OCT). Recommendations for the entire education system are included in the report, from the Ministry of Education to the school boards, the Ontario College of Teachers, faculties of education (responsible for training future teachers), and the teachers' union. Logically, since all appear to have stumbled in their mission and are failing the students they are entrusted to teach. 

 

A report released by the Jewish Educators and Families Association of Canada is urging the ministry of education to depoliticize Ontario's public school curriculum. Photo by GlobalStock iStock / Getty

 

"Yes, the Ontario government has the Trillium List of approved textbooks, but it's 2025. When's the last time any of your kids came home with a textbook? They don't. Textbooks aren't being used, so having an approved list of textbooks is moot."

"What we need are all teaching or learning resources in the classroom to be centrally made by the ministry, to be approved, for teachers to be trained on how to use those materials, and then for them to exclusively use those materials."

"JEFA's message is simple. Let schools be schools. Let's teach the basics."

Tamara Gottlieb, JEFA