Media Releases

Public favourable to increased education spending, according to OISE’s 19th Opinion Survey

December 8, 2015

TORONTO, ON– Despite the polit­i­cal chal­lenges regard­ing Ontario’s pub­licly fund­ed edu­ca­tion sys­tem, there remains gen­er­al sat­is­fac­tion among the pub­lic as a whole, and par­ents more specif­i­cal­ly. This is accord­ing to the 19th OISE Sur­vey of Edu­ca­tion­al Issues, the Ontario Insti­tute for Stud­ies in Education’s bi-annu­al sur­vey of pub­lic atti­tudes towards edu­ca­tion, released today.

“A major­i­ty actu­al­ly favours increased spend­ing on schools, and most of them are will­ing to pay high­er tax­es to sup­port this,” accord­ing to report’s co-author Arlo Kempf.

Find­ings also note sup­port of provin­cial test­ing along with the impor­tant role that teach­ers play in assess­ing stu­dents. Also evi­dent is strong sup­port for full-day kinder­garten and its empha­sis on inquiry/­play-based learn­ing. Pub­lic opin­ion grid­lock remains when it comes to fund­ing both pub­lic and sep­a­rate schools ver­sus a sin­gle sys­tem, accord­ing to the sur­vey.

“We weren’t sur­prised by the strong inter­est in more tech­nol­o­gy in the schools, but we were sur­prised that most favoured greater oppor­tu­ni­ties for stu­dents to earn cred­it for learn­ing out­side of the school set­ting, giv­en this issue has not received much media atten­tion,” says co-author Doug Hart.

“We are hope­ful that par­ents, edu­ca­tion­al lead­ers, pol­i­cy mak­ers and the media will find this 32 page report of sig­nif­i­cant use for informed dia­logue about issues fac­ing Ontario’s fine pub­licly fund­ed sys­tem,” observed OISE inter­im Dean Glen Jones.

About the Ontario Insti­tute for Stud­ies in Edu­ca­tion, Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to
The Ontario Insti­tute for Stud­ies in Edu­ca­tion (OISE) of the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to is a world-leader in research and grad­u­ate stud­ies in edu­ca­tion. OISE is Canada’s only all-grad­u­ate insti­tute of teach­ing, learn­ing and research in edu­ca­tion, offer­ing world-class pro­grams includ­ing grad­u­ate prepa­ra­tion for a career in teach­ing.

More infor­ma­tion: 2015 OISE Sur­vey Report High­lights & Full Report,
Back­grounder on the OISE Sur­vey Reports, Pre­vi­ous OISE Sur­vey Reports

-30-

For more infor­ma­tion:

Arlo Kempf, Pro­fes­sor and Co-Author of OISE Sur­vey
647–383-7043

Sarah Jorstad, Senior Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Offi­cer
416–458-2136, sarah.jorstad@utoronto.ca