Catholic principals slam minister over Ontario budget call to freeze wages
By Ron Stang, Catholic Register Special
WINDSOR, Ont. - Ontario Education Minister Leona Dombrowsky was taken to task by Catholic principals and vice principals here over her government’s recent budget bill which could hit them in the wallet.Bill 16 proposes that non-bargaining employees across the public sector — about 350,000 employees altogether — have their wages frozen for two years as part of an austerity move by the province to cope with a severe deficit.
Dombrowsky was speaking before more than 300 delegates at the annual meeting of the the Catholic Principals’ Council of Ontario in Windsor April 22.
For Iraqi families that have endured months and years living as refugees in Damascus and Beirut, just landing in Canada doesn't solve all their problems.
But the Ontario's publicly funded Catholic schools come close. Take a virtual visit to St. Andrew's Catholic School in Etobicoke.
TORONTO - Ontario’s public Catholic schools will always assert their right to teach students Catholic doctrine on matters of faith and morality, says the Institute of Catholic Education.“When it comes to matters of faith and morality, denominational rights accorded to the Catholic schools of Ontario supersede any Government of Ontario directives which are at variance with the teachings of the church,” said ICE executive director Sr. Joan Cronin.
TORONTO - Anna Zappone stands less than four feet tall holding a beach-ball sized model of the Earth and its atmosphere. She’s no scientist, yet. But she’s figured out a thing or two about global climate change.
MISSISSAUGA, Ont. - The award-winning novel Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson is back on school shelves for Catholic students in Dufferin-Peel west of Toronto. 
TORONTO - May 11 marked the first Toronto Catholic District School Board collaboration with students to promote leadership on pro-life issues. The TCDSB hosted it’s annual Respect for Life Week but turned its usual keynote address into a student leadership day which drew more than 70 students to learn about the issues and how to take action.
Sudbury Catholic Schools’ native language teacher Verna Hardwick combines her aboriginal roots and Catholic faith in the classroom, sharing her gift of song and First Nations culture to students who have lost touch with their own language and roots. Hardwick, 57, recently released a CD entitled Aanii (which means “hello” in Ojibwe) with songs featuring drumming and sung in the native language. This CD is now a teaching tool in her classes at St. David and St. Raphael Catholic School.
{mosimage}TORONTO - One hundred years on and St. Anthony’s Catholic School is still teaching girls like Hailey Moreno reading, spelling and arithmetic, plus getting them ready for first Communion. In the last weeks of her Grade 1 year, Moreno is more than happy the centenarian school is going strong in a brand new building.
{mosimage}HUNTSVILLE, Ont. - Public school trustees have voted down a call to eliminate Ontario’s Catholic school system by a margin of almost two to one.
{mosimage}MISSISSAUGA, Ont. — Michael Bator announced his retirement after 34 years in education.
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TORONTO - Fully Alive has a new lease on life. A revised and updated second edition of the Ontario Catholic school system’s family life program was launched with a teacher-training seminar on the new Grade 1 and 2 text books in Toronto June 11 and 12.
TORONTO - The first-ever Grade 11 world religion textbook from a Canadian Catholic perspective is coming to Ontario Catholic schools this fall.World Religions: A Canadian Catholic Perspective is published by Novalis Publishing Inc. and Nelson Education Ltd. and will update the previous text that had been used for the Grade 11 course.
In 2008, the Assembly of Bishops of Ontario (then known as the Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops) commissioned the Institute for Catholic Education to write a proposal and approach publishing companies to have the textbook written.
It’s not politics as usual at the Halton Catholic District School Board. A divided board in the region to Toronto’s west has voted non-confidence in the chair and vice chair voted in just four months ago.
{mosimage}TORONTO - The Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops has given the go ahead to write the first-ever Grade 11 world religion textbook from a Canadian Catholic perspective.