What Better Way to Plan a Child’s Future… Then by Rolling Dice in a Back Office?
Through tending and trust, nature creates pearls and diamonds — together we nurture our community, where wisdom and connection become our light.
Day # 3! Let me tell you what it’s like to fight for your child’s basic inclusion in Ontario’s public education system.
My son, who was legally enrolled in Grade 3, was excluded from EQAO testing without notice, consultation, or a legitimate exemption. Then, I discovered that school staff had privately discussed skipping him straight to Grade 5 next year—bypassing Grade 4 entirely—without any academic review, developmental assessment, or conversation with me as his parent.
Why? Because he’s a “December baby” who began school one year later under the Education Act, a legally approved delay by the York Region District School Board - all in ONTARIO!
I followed the rules. I reached out with a detailed letter to the Ministry of Education, EQAO, and the Simcoe County DSB. No one responded. Not even an acknowledgment.
Instead, I was told:
“The email addresses you used (listed on the official education Website) were wrong.”
“That’s not the big boss anymore.”
“The board website is outdated.”
Yes—laugh! I explained that I had used their own official website.
🔍 So I ask: If a system can’t even update its own leadership contact list, how is it trusted to make life-altering decisions for children without consent?
🧩 This isn’t a glitch. It’s a pattern: a polished system of delays, passive-aggression, shifting blame, and gaslighting designed, and I am exhausted.
🎯Every child deserves to belong—not be silently erased.
This is the bitter cost of advocacy: Being labelled “difficult,” Being gaslit, losing trust.
📍 I registered online. I submitted the documents. I followed every step the system asked of me. And yet—when something went wrong, the blame quietly shifted to the school staff.
“They didn’t check.”
I found myself apologizing, justifying, even protecting them, while feeling something I didn’t want to admit: shame. I felt horrible.
But this—this is my son.
Then came the question I haven’t been able to silence:
“Do you advocate for other children the way you are for your own?”
The truth? No. Not like this. I’ve supported. I’ve suggested. I’ve shown up.
But when I once offered a sensory-based intervention idea for a child in need, I was told:
“Stay in your lane.”
So I did. Because I understand how survival works in these systems.
And I don’t blame the staff. I know what it means to hold your breath to keep your job, while trying to show up with heart.
But to the big bosses of the region—those who don’t reply to emails, don’t update public directories, and don’t return calls:
It doesn’t. It makes you look like you’re too busy to see the harm you oversee. Like you’re just rolling the dice and calling it policy.