Ministry appoints supervisor with PC connections, limited education experience to take over PDSB; fears mount that equity work will be marginalized

After weeks of uncertainty, the PC government announced Thursday that it will maintain control of the Peel District School Board and appointed a supervisor to review “concerns about infighting and long-term financial unsustainability that risk disrupting learning and undermining student outcomes.”

In a press release Thursday afternoon, the Ministry of Education announced Heather Watt as the supervisor of the PDSB. The same role was also announced for the York Catholic District School Board, making it onto the list of eight school boards in Ontario now under provincial control. 

This marks the second time the PC government has been forced to take control of the PDSB due to its mismanagement, after Bruce Rodrigues was appointed to take over governance of the board in 2020, to protect racialized students who had for decades suffered harm caused by elected trustees. 

Sources inside the board previously told The Pointer that if supervision continued beyond the initial 14-day period announced in January, widespread financial mismanagement would be uncovered including the creation of unnecessary new administrative positions at the expense of protecting educators and classroom support staff. 

After the initial January announcement of supervision, the PDSB was given 14 days to provide a report outlining how it planned to address the financial concerns and infighting raised by Calandra. According to the ministry, that report was submitted, but unsatisfactory.

“Following a detailed analysis of the board's response, the Minister of Education has decided to continue the board's supervision,” a statement on the Ontario government website outlines. 

Questions are already being raised about whether Watt has the relevant experience in the education sector, or the expertise to be able to untangle the complex demographic dynamics PDSB’s leadership has failed to manage. 

The release explains Watt has worked in “crisis consulting and senior strategy roles across multiple sectors, including government, life sciences, health insurance, pharmacy, consumer products, industrials and private equity.” 

According to her LinkedIn profile, Watt previously worked as a chief of staff to the deputy premier and minister of health and long-term care from 2018 to 2022. Watt was also the “primary assistant” to former PC MPP Christine Elliott from 2006 to 2008.

“The appointment of Heather Watt by the Ford government is a total disregard for the racialized communities of Peel, especially the Black communities that bear the brunt of injustice,” Idris Orughu, a parent advocate who was instrumental in exposing systemic racism within the board, told The Pointer Thursday. “Heather Watt does not have any experience to tackle the multifaceted issues of the PDSB as it pertains to education, or the diversity and equity issues for which the PDSB was previously taken over by this same government.”

Orughu questioned how Thursday’s decision aligns with the previous supervision ordered by the PCs during their first term of office under Doug Ford, alleging the move is a sharp turn away from the objectives aggressively pushed by the previous ministry leadership to eradicate systemic discrimination within the PDSB.

“This is a complete obliteration of all of Minister Lecce's accomplishments and their own 27 directives (to eliminate systemic racism). Where would the appointed supervisor draw her experience from? And why was the PDSB taken over initially (in 2020) if this was the plan all along?”

The current minister has been vague about his reasons for the heavy-handed move, which strips elected trustees of their governance role.

“After careful review, it is clear that both Peel and York Catholic are facing serious challenges that they cannot resolve on their own,” Paul Calandra, Minister of Education said in a press release, claiming the supervisors will “restore sound management, strengthen oversight and ensure every decision is focused on protecting student learning and success.”

It’s unclear what, if any, experience Watt has in the education system. 

Rodrigues, who was appointed to the same role in 2020, when he took over governance of the PDSB with the priority of overseeing and implementing the anti-discrimination directives, came with more than 30 years of experience in the sector, including his critical role as the former deputy minister of education. 

PDSB Trustee Kathy McDonald has for almost a decade led the effort to rehabilitate the board by eliminating its culture of systemic discrimination, and supported the original takeover in 2020 after her tireless work was repeatedly stonewalled by fellow trustees and the former director of education, who was fired when the provincial government took over almost six years ago, before control was handed back to trustees after the 27 directives were supposed to have been mostly implemented.

“This does not come as a surprise to me, as the writing was on the wall,” McDonald told The Pointer Thursday, while away on vacation, shortly after learning of the provincial takeover. “The minister has high expectations of the public education system and the powers that be to lead and govern effectively. We at the PDSB did not measure up time and time again. I am not into semantics but a lot of the decisions that were being made did not have student achievement as the focus. We as a collective failed to hold our only employee accountable for some of the decisions that were being made.”

NDP Education Critic Chandra Pasma was quick to criticize the appointment as another example of the PC government “putting politics ahead of students”. 

“It’s nearly impossible to see how this decision will help students. Instead of bringing in experienced educators who understand classrooms and student needs, Minister Calandra has handed control to former Conservative government staffers, one of whom is a casino executive and the other being a Harris-era Chief of Staff,” Pasma said in a statement. 

Pasma says Calandra is “blatantly ignoring” the voices of those who should be at the centre of these discussions: students, parents and educators. Parents within Peel’s Catholic board, placed under supervision last year, raised concerns early with The Pointer about how the decision could impact their children's education. 

“Where is the accountability when what we’re seeing is more political interference in public education. When you put people with backgrounds in consulting and gambling in charge of our school boards, it feels like the Ford government is gambling away our kids’ future,” Pasma said. “If the Ford government truly cared about students, they would stop playing politics with our schools and start properly funding them. That means supporting educators, giving boards the stability they need, and listening to the voices that matter most in our education system.”

The deep reach of the PC government into Ontario school boards—eight in total, including Peel’s Catholic board—has a number of educators and trustees worried that the valuable directives to address deep-rooted anti-Black racism created as a result of Peel’s previous time under supervision, are being pushed aside. 

“Strong oversight and governance protect students,” Debbie King, Chair of the Black Trustees’ Caucus (BTC) wrote in a press release. “When trustees are removed from their roles and equity structures are paused or reduced, the system’s ability to identify and correct race-based disparities is weakened.”

The release was made public on February 24. At the time, the caucus raised concerns about the impact supervision would have on a board’s ability to implement needed equity work. The caucus highlighted the pause on the Black Student Achievement Community Advisory Committee at the Toronto District School Board; the “sidelining of representative governance leadership” at the PDSB; and the reduction in equity staff in the human rights office at the Thames Valley District School Board, which all occurred while the boards were under supervision. 

The instability of the Peel District School Board and its elected trustees to eliminate systemic anti-Black racism has routinely forced students and families to confront the system.

(The Pointer files)

“While supervision is intended to address governance or financial concerns, the BTC warns that the unintended consequence may be the erosion of oversight of anti-Black racism at a time when strong monitoring and community engagement are essential,” the release warns. 

According to PDSB staff during the preparation for the 2026 budget, 25 of the 27 binding directives from the province to address systemic, anti-Black racism were complete. Any delay in implementation in Peel, could cause further harm to visible minority students, after thousands suffered for decades. Questions still remain about the remaining two.

Trustee McDonald refused to support the budget over her concerns that not enough money was being directed to these initiatives.

“I did not support the budget for a few years because I had many similar concerns as the minister,” she said Thursday. “Regardless of whether or not you feel the funding is adequate we cannot continually over spend. It is imperative to be extra frugal in lean times. I don't believe it's prudent to ignore the direction of your ‘boss’ and give vague half cocked responses.”

McDonald says she hopes the latest provincial takeover will address the financial mismanagement she witnessed, while allowing the equity work to progress and finally eradicate systemic discrimination.

“I do believe in the case of the PDSB the concerns raised are legitimate. I cannot speak about other boards but at the PDSB we had our own leadership issues.”

She said, for now, she wants to see what Watt does right from the start.

“Only time will tell about the impact the newly appointed supervisor will have. It all depends on their ability to provide oversight to the system while serving the varied and complex needs of the PDSB students and their families.”

McDonald’s experience on the board suggests support for what many education sector observers in the province are predicting, the elimination of trustee positions by the PCs.

“In order to restore the confidence, trustees must be willing to not be puppets of senior administration. They need to be bold, read their reports and ask critical questions. One just needs to go back and listen to our meetings and see who is asking probing, thoughtful questions and who is just raising their hands with the majority.”

She questions if the trustee role has ever been properly understood as the central part of a critical legislative function in the public education system.

“It is important for trustees to understand that asking questions, not always agreeing with a report; or requesting information that we are entitled to as we govern, does not  make you a ‘non-team player’, it makes you a competent governance officer. 

“It is equally important to be transparent. As a trustee, one cannot effectively govern if there is no transparency. Trustees also have a critical role to play when reports are brought before us to ensure that the policies and procedures are being followed, that our process and procedures are fair and that we are listening and appropriately responding to the concerns of the students, staff, union groups and federations.” 

The initial takeover of the board was initiated after former education minister Stephen Lecce said he had seen enough evidence of systemic racism in the PDSB that had done devastating harm to students and their families for decades. Concrete action was desperately needed, and Lecce committed to the bold move, firing the director of education, at the time, shortly after. 

Following the intense scrutiny, in April of 2020, the PDSB, on behalf of its elected trustees and its senior leadership, issued a broad apology for decades of harm done to Black students. 

“In our Board, systemic racism exists,” the PDSB’s leadership at the time admitted in the public apology. “We must do all we can to eliminate the marginalization experienced by Black students and staff in Peel schools.”

Despite the apology, and implementation of nearly all of the ministry’s 27 binding directives, it is clear systemic, anti-Black racism and other forms of discrimination against racialized and Indigenous students have not been stamped out. 

It was on display recently when trustees made the decision to strip the late Kola Iluyomade’s name from the newly opened Centre for Black Excellence. 

He was instrumental in exposing the harmful anti-Black racism systemic within the PDSB. He passed away in 2021. The board committed to naming the Centre after him in 2022. 

Following a ceremony in November to celebrate the opening of the Centre, board Chair David Green made false claims about why Iluyomade’s name was dropped from the building despite the 2022 commitment by PDSB leadership and a direction from Lecce to do so. 

More evidence of the dysfunction within PDSB was made public last spring when the board’s former head of equity, Poleen Grewal, filed a $7.4 million lawsuit against Director Rashmi Swarup and the PDSB. 

Residents and community groups voiced skepticism about the board’s commitment to stamp out systemic racism after the lawsuit was filed. 

The former associate director was responsible for addressing issues around alleged discrimination and guiding the PDSB into the future, following decades defined by a culture of systemic racism in an education system where some 85 percent of students are not white.

While questions of Watt’s background may have some concerned about her ability to oversee change at the PDSB, the need for outside intervention is clear as the board has repeatedly shown itself unable, or unwilling to change on its own.

The PDSB Employment Systems Review (ESR) report, conducted by Turner Consulting Group, was completed in March 2023. The report issued a total of 108 recommendations to the PDSB in light of the many shocking results found through its research which revealed systemic barriers, discriminatory work cultures, inequity in hiring processes and an astounding lack of action by the PDSB to address concerns from staff regarding these and many other issues. 

The report revealed that in many instances members of the PDSB created conditions for staff to feel unsafe, left some feeling intimidated and even threatened if they considered coming forward about their experiences. They also reported a lack of faith in the PDSB and its systems to meet their concerns and improve their work experience, while HR departments failed to create safe spaces for individuals to come forward.

Turner also found significant resistance to equity work mandated by the provincial government following the education ministry takeover of the PDSB’s governance in 2020.

A 2022 Workforce Census, which was also completed by Turner, revealed that “the information shared by employees about why they chose not to participate suggests that there are employees who do not support the Board’s efforts to achieve workplace equity and in fact chose to undermine this work by completing the census multiple times (offering positive ratings).” 

It found that “some also shared that they don’t see a connection between workplace diversity and the success of students.” 

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