Province announces funding for two new Ottawa high schools

Ontario’s education minister announced funding for two high schools in Ottawa — and says he’s going to transfer underutilized schools to boards that need the space.

Paul Calandra announced $77.7 million for a new Half Moon Bay Secondary School on Cambrian Road in Barrhaven for the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board, as well as $74.7 million for a new Mer Bleu high school on Brian Coburn Boulevard in Orléans for the Ottawa Catholic School Board. Both schools will offer space for over 1,400 students.

Another $9.7 million will go to an addition to l’École élémentaire publique Mamawi in the Conseil des écoles publiques de l’Est de l’Ontario (the French public school board), providing 104 new student spaces and 39 new licensed child care spaces

“We’re helping boards move quickly, which means shovels can be in the ground as early as spring 2026, said Calandra. 

That there has been an explosion in demand for French and Catholic education in the province, as well as French immersion, he said. Where there are under-utilized public English schools, as minister of education, he can order those moved over to French boards much quicker under Bill 33, which was passed on Nov. 19.

“And we will do that. We’re doing that in the Parry Sound area. We’re going to be doing that in the Sturgeon Falls area. And we’re looking at that across the system,” Calandra told reporters on Friday.

Enrolment at the Catholic and French boards has outpaced growth at the OCDSB, which is facing a $5.4-million deficit this school year. On Nov. 24, the OCDSB’s audit committee heard that enrolment at the board increased by more than 200 students, but that was still 1,130 students short of projections. The Ottawa Catholic School Board has reported an increase of 1,657 students as of Oct. 31.

When the province invests in schools, it’s for the people of the province as a whole. The province is taking “a real hard look” at French schools, both Catholic and public, because that’s where there has been growth, said Calandra

On Monday, after releasing the results of EQAO standardized tests, Calandra noted that students in French schools in Ontario outperformed their counterparts in English schools, and in some regions, Catholic board students also outperformed those from public boards, he said.

“It shouldn’t matter which students are learning in them. As you see the French boards, they’re exploding and we’ve got to make sure that they have sufficient dollars to meet the demands,” said Calandra on Wednesday.

“It is quite remarkable, and in certain parts of the province, transportation to our French schools is in many instances, I think, too long because of the lack of school space available for them,” Calandra told reporters. “There’s more work to be done on that, and Bill 33 gives me an opportunity to make these moves much quicker.”

Among other measures, Bill 33 gives the province’s education minister new powers to take control of school boards. In June, Calandra announced that the OCDSB was being placed under provincial supervision. There are currently six school boards under supervision in the province, with a provincially-appointed supervisor responsible for making decisions and the powers of elected trustees suspended.

Calandra has called running school boards with elected trustees “an outdated model” that goes back to the days of the one-room schoolhouse. He argued that trustee elections have low turnout with an acclamation rate of 40 per cent. (The Ontario Public School Boards’ Association denies this. Voter turnout for trustees is at about the same level as for mayors, reeves, regional chairs, and councillors, and Ontario’s English public school boards saw 66 acclamations for 317 trustee positions, according to the association.)

Calandra said he hasn’t provided advice on the governance model to cabinet yet, but nothing has changed his mind, and he doesn’t see trustees returning to the OCDSB anytime soon.

He also noted that the French and Catholic system have constitutional guarantees and he won’t be closing or amalgamating school boards, introducing charter schools, or merging the public and Catholic systems.

“I think they are an integral part of delivering a very good education system in the province of Ontario,” said Calandra. 

Meanwhile, when asked about the controversial elementary boundary review at the OCDSB, which was cancelled by the province’s supervisor, Bob Plamondon, Calandra said there will have to be changes, but there were concerns about the process.

The goal of the review was to return as many students as possible to neighbourhood schools and to offer both French immersion and English in schools, to balance out school populations and ensure all elementary schools remained viable, senior administrators argued during the contentious process of redrawing the boundaries.

“People were just horrified by the process, the lack of involvement and lack of consultation, and how it was really starting to split up communities,” said Calandra.

“There will continue to be changes across the province, when we need to modernize boundaries and we build new schools.”