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Education minister speaks on local hot topics Continued from page 1 5 · Wednesday, May 16, 2012 OAKVILLE BEAVER · www.insideHALTON.com Despite the resignation of Elizabeth Witmer, the PC MPP who brought Bill 14 to Legislature, Broten said, "I still believe there's very good advice in Bill 14." "I look to incorporate that in Bill 13, but one of the key components in Bill 13 is obviously a structure that allows students to start their own clubs and organizations to have conversations, whether it's about issues involving race, gender, sexual orientation, amongst other things." While the issue of competing bills is being sorted out at Queen's Park, Broten also spoke about Halton-specific issues. French Immersion Recently, the Halton District School Board realigned its school boundaries in northwest Oakville because its two French Immersion schools there became overpopulated. To resolve the problem, the board added French Immersion programing to two more schools to the chagrin of many parents whose children will now be forced to change schools as a result of the decision. The move came just after a 2009 board review of boundaries in the area. When asked if the ministry could step in, Broten said the provincial government has a funding role, while local programming implementation falls to school boards. "We leave the local decision making to the locally elected trustees and school boards because they know their community," she said. NIKKI WESLEY / OAKVILLE BEAVER / @halton_photog TALKING EDUCATION: Ontario Minister of Education Laurel Broten speaks with Oakville Beaver reporter Dominik Kurek at the Beaver offices Friday. What the Province is committed to, she said, is continuing to roll out full-day kindergarten and continuing to pay for small class sizes among other things. Special education Broten also spoke about another hot topic in Halton schools -- special education. Less than a year ago, students who needed psychoeducational assessments at the public board were faced with an average wait time of approximately 15 months. Since then, the wait list has been slashed in half. Despite the long wait times for assessments, Broten said students on the wait list are not left to fend for themselves. "Our focus is on the services and the supports for students and more than one-third of students that receive the special needs supports and ser- vices in our schools do not have an assessment. We give them those supports and services based on the need demonstrated in the school," she said. The minister said staff members at school are equipped to determine if a child needs more support even if the child has not had an official assessment by a consultant. Furthermore, she said the Province has increased its investment in special education, in the way of a 55 per cent funding increase since 2003, to the current $2.5 billion per year. Another $257 million over three years is going to schools and communities through investments by Children's Mental Health Ontario. Additionally, three ministries: health, education, and children and youth services, are working to improve speech therapy programming. "We're running some pilots across the province now to see how we can develop a more streamlined model, a model that has less silos and better utilizes resources for kids," she said. Broten said the Province is committed to special education. "Our key focus in schools is making sure our students succeed and a huge part of that is making sure our students with special needs have special support to succeed in school," she said. Broten, an Etobicoke-Lakeshore MPP, has been education minister since October 2011. She also serves as the minister responsible for women's issues.