KEEPING OUR CHILDREN SAFE THROUGH REMOTE LEARNING

MPP Anand’s forty-second Members’ Statement was on the topic of “Keeping Our Children Safe Through Remote Learning”, delivered on 3 June 2021.

Mr. Speaker, as many of my colleagues are aware, I have a daughter in Grade 10 who was looking forward to going back to school. Yesterday, I had to face her and let her know about one of the toughest decisions our province has made.

I know how tough COVID has been on our youth for the last 14 months.

I thank the parents and teachers across Ontario for keeping our kids safe and engaged. More importantly, I want to thank students for their patience, hard-work, and resilience.

That being said, due to the presence of the highly transmissible, deadlier, unpredictable DELTA variant, we need to be extremely cautious.

Yesterday morning, Peel Region’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Loh, said that the Delta variant would be the dominant variant in the Region by the end of the month, well before the rest of the province. We need to protect the health and well-being of our communities.

This will also help the province ensure other activities vital to kids’ mental health, such as day camps, outdoor pools, and sports training, can go forward during Step 1 of the reopening. I am also happy to share our graduating students can have outdoor, COVID-safe celebrations of their important milestone.

I’m confident that with more teachers and children fully vaccinated, we will have a happy, active, more normal summer, and a safe return to schools come September.