OPEN LETTER for the Immediate Creation of a Pilot Outdoor Learning Programme at TDSB Schools
To add your name to this OPEN LETTER to the TDSB Interim Director, Kathy Witherow, please use this form. We welcome all community members to sign, as it is important to show that outside learning spaces at public schools help decrease risks for everyone: the students and staff outside, inside the school, the neighbourhood and the whole city.
October 14, 2020
Re: Immediate Creation of Pilot Outdoor Learning Spaces Programme at TDSB schools
Dear Director Witherow,
Transmission of Covid-19 is increasing exponentially across Toronto. International covid-19 experts agree the outdoors are safer than the indoors for social gathering, especially over longer periods of time. The Chief Public Health Officer of Canada, Dr. Tam, has recommended to Canadians “Activities in the open air are safer than indoors.” The Washington Post has reported that six feet distancing between individuals — especially indoors — may not be enough to limit the transmission of this virus, at its highest rate since the pandemic started in the city of Toronto.
These recommendations also extend to educational institutions. The Hospital for Sick Children offers the following recommendations on page 10 of their document COVID-19: Guidance for School Re-Opening [PDF]”
- Where needed, the use of non-traditional spaces should be explored to accommodate smaller classes in order to allow daily school attendance. This may necessitate additional teacher/educational resources.
- Educators should be asked to assess and incorporate outdoor learning opportunities as weather permits. This will likely require specific programming and resources to optimize learning activities.”
The Globe and Mail published that “Recent reports from Harvard University and a group of Ontario hospitals have recommended moving classes outside when possible because the risk of transmitting COVID-19 is much lower there. The idea itself is not new: Open-air schoolrooms were built to prevent the spread of tuberculosis in some North American cities in the early 20th century.”
The TDSB claims it “is encouraging outdoor learning, but how and if it’s carried out will depend on individual schools.” On the ground, this has thus far resulted in an ad hoc, inequitable patchwork of outdoor learning experiments across the city, reliant on the extraordinary efforts of individual random administrations, teachers and parents who have gone above and beyond their capacities. It has also resulted in unnecessary conflicts over interpretations of policy, best practices and the weighing of risks and benefits of different scenarios. Too often, TDSB policy continues to be cited to school principals and administrators as grounds to prohibit or undo community-generated solutions that would safely get more kids and teachers outdoors, more often. Recently, some of these creative outdoor learning spaces have been ordered removed by TDSB superintendents.
Meanwhile, other boards in Ontario are taking much more proactive approaches to outdoor learning across their sites, as documented in The Toronto Star. Right here in Toronto, the Toronto Catholic School Board, for example, is piloting a rapid response tent programme across 18 schools (replete with building permits), with the intention to scale up. Sudbury’s Rainbow District School Board recently had a school profiled positively in the press for its embrace of pop-up classrooms using shade tents and tree stumps. A school in Hamilton is teaching students outdoors all day.
Because of the overwhelming scientific evidence along with viable precedents at comparable boards, we are calling on the TDSB to immediately create a Interim Pilot Outdoor Learning Programme that supports schools and teachers to deliver a wide range of curricula (beyond physical education) outside. This would be available for teachers who wish to teach outside for whatever parts of the day they wish. This issue was brought forward at the October 5th Special Committee of the Whole and schools across Toronto are coming together to jointly advocate for this pilot program.
We call on the Director to initiate a pilot project in 24 schools across the TDSB (6 per Learning Centre) with an appropriate mix of elementary and secondary schools that reflect the diverse demographics of the City of Toronto. This pilot project will be led by a Steering Committee comprised of senior staff, the Toronto Outdoor Education Schools department, teacher unions, and CUPE 4400. Principals from Model Schools, the Principal of Kapapamahchakwew — Wandering Spirit School and/or a representative from the Urban Indigenous Education Centre, and the Principal from the Africentric Alternative School, a representative from Safer Outside TO and any other representatives the Director believes are recommended will also be invited to be on the steering committee. This pilot will begin in November 2020 and report to the Board of Trustees in June 2021.
This Pilot TDSB programme would be funded to rapidly test and scale outdoor learning options that include:
Phase One:
- For schools where there is a prior commitment from teachers and parents, approve the outdoor learning spaces that have already set up and empower principals with the authority to approve initiatives
- Allow participating schools to provide shelter from the elements for the students
- Allow parent volunteers with Covid-screening to assist in helping implement these outdoor learnings outside of school hours
- Provide support to Model Schools who wish to participate in this pilot program
- Provide supplies such as clipboards, workbooks, and voice amplifiers for teachers who require them
- Centralize, coordinate and redistribute parental volunteer time and donations to ensure equity across the board
Phase Two:
- Information, best practices collection and sharing
- Resource allocation
- Individualized design support
- Supplies (clipboards, voice amplifiers, etc.)
- Review of relevant policy esp. that which continues to impede the development of small footprint outdoor learning spaces on TDSB school grounds
- Flexible infrastructure, including building permits for tents
- Implementation at 24 pilot sites
We ask that a programme be immediately created, with Phase One on the ground implementation of first steps ASAP.
Every single time an outdoor learning space is made available and used, it contributes to the safety of the individuals in that class, to the safety of other classes conducted at that school indoors, and to the safety of the wider community.
We believe this is a relatively low cost creative solution geared to meet the needs of these uncertain times, but we also know one of the principles the TDSB has highlighted in reopening is to “be adaptable and flexible.” We believe Toronto can be a leader in promoting outdoor learning as a means to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 among schoolchildren and their families.
We urge you to act now.
Signed,
We welcome all community members to sign, as it is important to show that outside learning spaces at public schools help decrease risks for everyone: the students and staff outside, inside the school, the neighbourhood and the whole city. Please include your name, ward, and role and these will be displayed publicly as a signatory to the letter. Please also include your email and other details (which will not be shared) if you would like to stay connected to Safer Outside TO.
Please add your name to the list by using this form.
