Students at a handful of Toronto schools will get a taste of summer vacation as classes shut down for two days because of the G20 summit.
The schools — six public, two Catholic — are near the G20 security zone and protest areas so the two Toronto boards decided to close them Thursday and Friday as world leaders arrive.
“We decided that it would be in the students’ best interest to cancel school for those two days, since they are right up against the security perimeter” and wider traffic zones where congestion and delays are expected, said Chris Broadbent, the Toronto District School Board’s manager of occupational health and safety.
The affected public schools are: ALPHA Alternative, Beverley, Ogden, Orde Street, Waterfront School, Island Public/Natural Science School.
The Island school is included because most staff live in the city and there is no guarantee ferries will be running as scheduled, Broadbent added.
Daycares in the affected schools have been notified, and most are shutting down at the end of the week, he also said.
Corrado Maltese, safety manager for the Toronto Catholic District School Board, said the two schools affected are near areas that will likely see protests. St. Joseph’s College, an all-girls’ school, is near Queen’s Park, and St. Michael’s Choir, an all-boys, just steps from Dundas Square.
“We thought closing them was the prudent thing to do,” Maltese said.
Meanwhile, Councillor Adam Vaughan (Ward 20-Trinity Spadina) said three city-run centres will offer free child care for families impacted by the school closings with programming for school-age children.
The centres are: Alexandra Park, Scadding Court and University Settlement House. More information is available at the Ward 20
The G20 summit is causing several inconveniences for several people such as: students, teachers, store owners, employees, and several other business people. This isn't just an inconvenience, but a waste of money in my opinion. The country has spent over a billion dollars on the summit which is a huge waste of tax payers money. The money spent on the summit could of been used to help Haiti, enhance our health care, improve our subway system, or even fix our roads. Canada is a very big country and all they had to do was have the summit somewhere in a remote location in Canada, and they would of had to spend was a few million dollars not billions. The summit could of been held in another location in Ontario where it wouldn't interfere with the education of students and peoples jobs. The summit also effects the downtown core workers because they have to have special ID, and they have to follow certain precautions just to get to work. Also some workers would not even be able to get to work that day because of all the congestion. The location of the summit has to be the worse place possible in Canada to have it, in one of the busiest parts of the country. The summit is closing eight schools, and it's already the end of the year which means that there are exams going on. Having schools shut down at the end of the year when exams are finishing won't help the students in any way because their exams will be postponed which puts more stress on students. Also parents who send their children to daycare centers will have to find an alternative place to send their children for that one day which will take up more time foe the commute for parents downtown. The G20 summit is expected to come out with some very good resolutions because it has caused a lot of controversy with the citizens of Toronto.
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