Amid a growing resistance to the Ford government’s plan to revert to the 1998 sex-ed curriculum, one school board is now saying it has no plans to teach the outdated material.

Without clear direction, resources and funding to train the many teachers who are unfamiliar with it, the director of the Rainbow District School Board in northern Ontario, says it’s not feasible to return to the old curriculum, which was introduced in 1998 and taught until the updated curriculum was introduced in 2015.

Rainbow is the first board to take such a strong stand.

“First of all, we don’t have that (curriculum) at the tip of our fingers — that’s old,” said Norm Blaseg, who heads the 13,300-student board that serves Sudbury, Espanola, Manitoulin Island and Shining Tree.

“We’ve moved on since then — and unless the ministry directs us through a memo and is providing us with a new curriculum and the professional development that goes with it,” Blaseg said, he does not expect his staff to teach it.

“Teachers who were hired in the last three years — there’s no context for the (old) curriculum,” said Blaseg, who estimates his small board has between 60 to 100 elementary educators who are new to the job.

“This is very challenging for boards,” he said, adding “it’s an unusual path that the new government is going. Unless they address all of those challenges, I don’t see us moving away from the current curriculum.”

A number of boards have said they will use the 1998 curriculum but continue to teach about same-sex families and gender — even though they are not topics covered in the previous curriculum.

The government’s move to revive the two-decade-old lessons while it holds consultations in all 124 ridings across the province has come under fire from teacher unions, school boards and health organizations.

Some 24 English public boards, as well as the organization representing French public boards, have all publicly raised concerns that issues like cyberbullying and consent are not included in the previous lessons.

On Wednesday, Education Minister Lisa Thompson was asked repeatedly if teachers who use the new curriculum could face punishment, but she did not appear to want a standoff.

“We’re going to be working with all of our school boards and again, teachers are going to be utilizing the curriculum that was last used in 2014,” she said.

She also said there’s “ample room” to address “current social issues” in the old lessons, and that details will be released “in the coming days” on the “fulsome consultations” which parents have told the Progressive Conservatives they wanted.

Boards have received no details from the province on the changes, and government ministers have given them confusing messages.

A suggestion from Deputy Premier Christine Elliott that teachers can speak in private with students about issues not covered in the old curriculum has been widely criticized as inappropriate — and even in violation of their professional standards.

“Hopefully, that was taken out of context,” Blaseg said of Elliott’s comment. “I would not put a teacher in that situation. There’s a whole College of Teachers issue with regards to having these conversations, I’m sure, and I’m sure the local federations are not happy.

“Quite frankly, I don’t blame them.”

Many critics have said the government would have been better off maintaining the status quo while consulting.

Blaseg said his board received “less than a handful” of complaints from parents about it.

Cathy Abraham, who heads the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association, which supports using the new curriculum, said the Rainbow board is “within their rights to make that decision for themselves, and we will support our boards in any way we can.”

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

She said teacher training is an issue. “That is a fair statement to say — not every teacher will know what’s in the old curriculum.”

Liberal MPP Mitzie Hunter (Scarborough-Guildwood), a former education minister, said not only is using the outdated curriculum “a danger, there’s also a danger in having no standards, and no direction.”

School boards have said that not teaching about gender or LGBTQ issues would be in violation of human rights laws.