Committee of the Whole Budget: March 18, 2025

Written By Cathryne Milburn

The Committee of the Whole Budget meeting for the Ottawa-Carleton District School took place on March 18, 2025. Staff brought forward one report with one recommendation for discussion.

I voted in favour of the recommendations in Report 25-013 on the Staffing Plan for 2025 to 2026. The staffing plan is the first step of the annual budgetary process and represents approximately 55% of the total operating budget. Academic staffing includes all school based, central elementary, central secondary, principals and vice-principals. In addition, discretionary positions such as English as a Second Language, special education, and central instructional coaches.

The staffing timelines are established in collective agreements and are based on timelines necessary to plan timetables and assign teachers for the upcoming school year. Required positions are classroom teacher positions that are tied directly to student enrolment.

Based on preliminary kindergarten to grade 12 enrolment projections, there is a decrease of 46.78 full-time equivalent positions due to a modest decrease in projected enrolment due to declining birth rates and Kindergarten aged students and fewer international students in the Ottawa area. Below are the projected enrolment numbers for 2025 to 2026:

There is a decrease of 18 full-time e-learning teachers beginning in the 2025 to 2026 school year, as a result of increasing the student to teacher ratio to 35:1. Staff are recommending a decrease of approximately 52.16 FTE discretionary staff. The majority of these positions are not school based.

What is not included in this Staffing Plan is the non-academic staff includes education assistants, early childhood educators, office staff, school support staff, facilities, planning employees’ services and represents approximately 26% of the operating budget. These positions are expected to come in front of the board for approval in May. As of right now there is a planned reduction of approximately 80 FTE non-academic staff. Senior staff overseeing central departments have engaged in revisioning how the work of these employees and departments can be done differently.

The plan includes an estimated number of teaching staff in elementary and secondary schools with adjustments for the double count which can be found in the below table:

The plan includes school-based and centrally assigned positions. The total proposed budget for academic staffing is $659 million which provides for 4,953.03 full-time equivalent (FTE) teacher positions. The anticipated staffing reductions are below:

The District does not have the accumulated financial reserves to run a deficit budget. At the time of this report, the provincial budget has not been released and we have no indication of any substantive funding for increased cost pressures or new initiatives. Staff remain hopeful that the Core Ed will address some of these cost pressures.

During the discussion, I made the following remarks (timestamp: 2:17:31):

I want to start by saying thank you to staff for continuing year over year to bring your dedication to building a budget that meets unrealistic expectations.

In regard to this specific report, I can appreciate what has been said tonight about why the details are light in the report tonight. If we can ensure the PowerPoint that was shown tonight is available on E-Scribe for transparency and so the public refer to it that would be appreciated.

I have and I am still listening to what everyone has to say but I am still concerned about the special education support and what our classrooms will look like with a reduction of those supports in any kind, not just in Educational Assistants.

I hate prioritizing our support because they are all important and make our public education system better. However, I constantly hear that special education support is not meeting our current needs, and we do a lot to support special education. I wish more school boards within Ontario did as much as us because it is the right thing to do.

I want to be clear; this is the provincial government’s fault and they need to own up to their mistakes and fix it. I am sitting around this board table as one of the new trustees and I am seeing staff that are burnt out from a budget process with technical papers that are delivered at the eleventh hour, funding that does not adequately fund our public education system, and timelines and requirements for a balanced budget that are unrealistic.

Everyone needs to demand that the provincial government does better. They need to do better for our public education.

The recommendation was carried.

Please note, that the opinions expressed here are entirely my own and do not reflect an official position of the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board or the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board of Trustees. Please note answers from staff are paraphrased, the recording can be found here if you would like to watch the entire meeting. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me using my contact form here.

Key links

  • Video for the Committee of the Whole Budget on March 18, 2025

  • Agenda for the Committee of the Whole Budget on March 18, 2025

Cathryne Milburn

By day I am passionate about diversity, inclusion, and communications. By night I am passionate about education, student well-being, and student achievement.

https://cathrynemilburn.com/
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