If you wanted to write a recipe for a lethal spike in youth violence, it might look something like this:

1. Slash funding for after-school programs, leaving kids in high-risk neighbourhoods with no place to go and nothing to do in the evenings, on weekends and in the summer.
2. Skimp on English-as-a-second-language classes, raising the frustration level and failure rate among kids struggling to adjust to a new culture.
3. Lay off school youth counsellors, depriving troubled kids of a ready source of help.
4. Impose a zero tolerance policy in the province's schools, mandating teachers to expel kids they can't discipline.
5. And throw in cutbacks to municipal recreation programs and social services.

"What shocks me," says Cathy Dandy of the Toronto Parent Network, "is that people are shocked that we're having problems in this city."
Her organization has just released its eighth annual report on the state of the city's schools. It provides more insight into this summer's outbreak of shootings than much of what passes for informed debate.

It shows, for instance, that 36 per cent of Toronto's schools were not open to community activities last year. Their gyms were off-limits, their playing fields were barred and their classrooms were locked after hours. Among schools that did make their facilities available, 80 per cent charged user fees. "This is a particular problem in low-income neighbourhoods where access to free programs is essential," the parents' group said.

It shows that the proportion of schools in Toronto with an English-as-a-second-language program has dropped from 80 per cent to 57 per cent in the past five years. That means tens of thousands of kids aren't getting the help they need to fit in at school. So they seek other forms of validation and belonging. "Without ESL, who becomes their family?" Dandy asked.

It shows an increasing polarization in Toronto's schools, as parents raise money to cover the shortfall in public funding. One school in an affluent neighbourhood raised $85,000 last year. But the majority (68 per cent) raised less than $10,000. "This enormous variation means that some schools can supplement the purchase of basic resources while also providing extras and some schools cannot."

It shows that only a handful of Toronto schools still have full-time music, phys. ed., performing arts and technology teachers. Often, these are the teachers who can reach a hostile, unmotivated student.

"All of the kids in the school system, from Grade 4 and up, have been through a resource-starved period," Dandy said. "I don't want to be inflammatory but actions do have consequences."

The parents' network gives Education Minister Gerard Kennedy credit for reinvesting in public education, cutting class sizes in the early grades, providing compensation to schools that open their doors to community groups and listening to its members.

The problem, Dandy says, is that after two years in power, the Liberals still haven't fixed the education funding formula, as Dr. Mordecai Rozanski recommended in 2002. He urged the province to provide local school boards with enough money to cover the cost of teachers' salaries and benefits.

The ministry's failure to do this means boards have to raid other envelopes — English-as-a-second-language funding; building maintenance; phys. ed., music and arts and technology courses; guidance and youth counselling; after-hours use of schools — to meet their payrolls.

The Toronto District School Board, for example, receives 9 per cent less from the province than it needs to pay its 15,890 teachers. Until this gap is closed, Dandy says, trying to strengthen the rest of the system "will be like pouring money into a sinkhole."

The 1,500 parents in the network understand and applaud the Liberals' desire to reduce class sizes in the early grades. But they fear that older students — the ones who bore the brunt of the education cutbacks in the '90s — are being overlooked. Over half of Toronto's Grade 4 to 8 classes (54 per cent) have 26 to 30 students and 11 per cent have more than 30.

The group acknowledges that it will take time to reverse the damage done by the previous Conservative government. But it warns that kids will keep falling off the ladder until the weak rungs are repaired.

Fortunately, most won't turn to guns, gangs and crime.

But it's a gamble. And sometimes, as this summer has proved, a safe, civilized city stops beating the odds.

Carol Goar
2 September 2005

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