When Data Just Isn’t Enough: - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

When Data Just Isn’t Enough:

The Underutilization of the Learning Opportunity Grants for Low-Income Learners across Ontario

Presenters:

Sharma Queiser: Social Planning Toronto

Yvonne Kelly: Social Planning Council of York Region,

York Region District School Board

Participants in the Knowledge Network for Student Well-Being -

Community of Practice on Equity and Inclusion for Low-Income Learners

FESI 2018

Acknowledgement of Indigenous Peoples and Traditional Territories

York University acknowledges its presence on the traditional territory of many Indigenous Nations. The area known as

Tkaronto

has been care taken by the Anishinabek Nation, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, the

Wendat

, and the Métis. It is now home to many Indigenous peoples. We acknowledge the current treaty holders and the

Mississaugas

of the New Credit First Nation. This territory is subject of the Dish With One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant, an agreement to peaceably share and care for the Great Lakes region.

Agenda

Icebreaker and Introductions

Setting the Stage – Purpose of the Session

The Learning Opportunity Grants

Overview and Background

Societal Consequences of Growing Inequity in Public Education

Questions for Small Groups

Case Study and Strategy Development in Small Groups; Report Back

Q and A

Welcome and Icebreaker

Name, title, and where you are from

Guiding Question for FESI Day 1:

Political Challenges and Opportunities

What are the present and historical challenges, opportunities, tensions and paradoxes of collecting, integrating and reporting on identity-based data?

Consider this guiding question as we interrogate some of the challenges and paradoxes of our current experience in Ontario of collecting data for the purpose of bridging gaps in learning outcomes for low-income learners.

What is the Learning Opportunities Grant?

Provides funding to help students who are at greater risk of lower academic achievement

Level the playing field for students who face disadvantage due to socio-demographic characteristics

How is the LOG-DA calculated?

Based on social and economic indicators that signal higher risk of academic difficulty

Low Income

50%

Recent Immigration

25%

Low Parental Education

12.5%

Lone Parent Status

12.5%

Derived from 2006 Census data

(

MoE

Technical Paper)

What is the purpose of the LOG-DA?

“The largest portion of LOG funding

– $358.2million –

is flowed through the Demographic Allocation, which provides funding

based on social and economic indicators

that are associated with students having a higher risk of academic difficulty. This allocation supports boards in offering a

wide range of locally determined programs

for

these

high risk students.

Examples of programs include breakfast programs, homework clubs, reading recovery, and withdrawal for individualized support. Boards have considerable latitude in determining the type of program and support that they provide with this funding.”

(pg. 66,

MoE

2017-18 Technical Paper)

So, how is the LOG-DA actually used?

LOG-DA is not “

sweatered

”

Expectation but not obligation

Missing Opportunities: Report

Programs directly targeting at-risk students:

i.e.

Model Schools for Inner Cities program

When resources are distributed equitably based on need:

i.e. Vice Principals

For Further Reading

Social Planning Toronto - Missing Opportunities: How Budget Policies Continue to Leave Behind Low-Income Students

People for Education - The Learning Opportunities Grant

Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives - No Time for Complacency: Education Funding Reality Check

Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives - Harris-era Hangovers: Toronto School Trustees’ Inherited Funding Shortfall

Issues at hand

Chronic

underfunding of the education system

Accountability and transparency

Evaluating impact

Poorer Outcomes for Low-income students extend beyond years in school, maintaining societal/class inequities

Poor outcomes at Post-Secondary

Societal Consequences of Growing Gaps in Public Education

When mechanisms are put in place to ensure all students have equitable opportunities to succeed, schools become vehicles of social mobility and can play a significant role in disrupting social inequalities, including (intergenerational) poverty.

And when mechanisms are not utilized, the opposite is true –

social inequalities persist.

The LOG not only provided a way to support

early intervention

and

create targeted programming for children and youth deemed at-risk, but it also positioned

redistributive equity

as an important educational, social

, and economic investment.

(Expert Panel on the Learning Opportunities Grant)

Growing the Gap Results in Poorer Outcomes for all of us...

However, LOG funding has deviated from original intent of the grant (redistributive equity) by focusing more on performance-driven initiatives.

(People for Education - The LOG 2017)

Neo-liberal Trends Worldwide:

Growing emphasis on Individual Responsibility VS Collective Responsibility

DIsadvantaged

social groups are preoccupied with fighting to maintain existing social entitlements rather then for social justice or equity beyond that.

The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better

(2009) highlights the "pernicious effects that inequality has on societies: eroding trust, increasing anxiety and illness, and encouraging excessive consumption."

Canada's income inequality is growing at a faster pace than even that of the US.

Interrogating the Context that Surrounds the Learning Opportunity Grants

Questions for Consideration in Small Groups

What are the

b

arriers

to allocating funding equitably?

Possible reasons why targeted funding would not be used in the way intended.

Pushback from stakeholders re: not spending LOG funds as intended.

Report Back from each Discussion (one person)

Developing Strategy to Promote Increased Utilization of Learning Opportunities Grants

Consider your

Case Study

Devise your Strategy

Identify your issue

Name the change that you want to see

Identify

your stakeholder group. Who do they respond to? Who are they responsible to?

Develop a strategy for bringing about the change you want to see

Present

your

strategy in the form of a pitch to the stakeholder group

Report Back from Small Group Strategy Sessions

Stakeholder Groups Report Back

Common Themes and Strategies

Questions and Answers

Reveal of the Mystery Phrases and Winners

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