On April 25th, 2024, the Board of Trustees approved a new policy on pregnancy and parental leave for Board trustees.

Trustees play an important role as they are the only publicly elected official with direct responsibility for the education of children. Trustees hold an “office” and are not employees of the OCDSB. Because they are not employees, Trustees do not currently receive certain unemployment benefits typically associated with District staff or Canadian legislation.

An update to the Education Act mandated that boards must allow 20 consecutive weeks of pregnancy and parental leave for Trustees. The Ontario Public School Board’s Association (OPSBA) provided a policy template to assist school boards in creating policies that cover pregnancy and parental leave for Trustees.

Staff presented Report No. 24-050 to the Ad Hoc Policy Committee on April 4th and to the Board of Trustees on April 25th. They discussed the draft policy, which integrated OPSBA’s recommendations, recommendations from staff, and feedback from the public and the Committee. The Board of Trustees approved the policy on April 25th.

You can view the new policy at the following link:

We held an online consultation on Engage OCDSB from February 8th to March 8th, 2024 and invited families, students, staff, and community members to share their feedback. We also gathered feedback from the Ad Hoc Policy Committee. This feedback helped to inform the revisions to the policy, including changes related to fostering, adoption, and privacy concerns. We would like to extend our gratitude to the OCDSB community for their feedback and participation in the consultation process.