Education was the topic at Monday night’s forum organized by local school boards, with Progressive Conservative candidate Rob Dekker conspicuously absent from another Ottawa Centre all-candidates debate.
However, NDP candidate Anil Naidoo, Kevin O’Donnell of the Green Party and the Communist Party's Stuart Ryan jousted verbally with Liberal incumbent Yasir Naqvi at Nepean High School.
Naqvi defended his party's track record in education, saying the Liberals injected $6.6 billion into the system since 2003, after cuts by the previous Conservative government of Mike Harris.
Pointing out that the Economist, a British magazine, credited the province for having "one of the world's best-performing schools systems," he staunchly stood by Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) testing, what he called "an important part of the education system" to ensure appropriate, targeted funding.
"The great benefit of standardized testing is to target money for students who need the most help, to narrow the gap from students of lower socioeconomic incomes and those from wealthier neighbourhoods. Those test scores have allowed us to find avenues . . . to find ways to restore that mechanism."
Naidoo said the standardized test "fails on so many levels," calling for more random testing that relieves the accountability of administration and principals without losing sight of the arts.
Both O'Donnell and Ryan agreed with Naidoo, calling for the elimination of standardized tests.
"While I love stats," admitted O'Donnell, "student success comes first."
The NDP candidate and Ryan disputed Naqvi's contention that the Liberals have been focused on changing Harris-initiated funding formulas since the 1990s, failing to live up to their promise in 2003 to reverse the Tory slashes to education.
"(The funding formula) is creating gaps in our infrastructure," said Naidoo, adding there is no greater socio-economic leveller than the school system.
"We need to invest in the school system . . . We're forcing school council to raise money for essentials. This is not a public school system."
He accused the Liberals of advancing Harris' funding formula agenda of demeaning the provincial school boards — a formula that has created disparities in the OCDSB in transportation, teacher salaries and capital funding, especially towards infrastructure, according to school board chair Jennifer McKenzie.
The hostility between the two leading candidates — Naidoo and Naqvi — was palpable, as the latter shot back that the only missing element in the NDP platform is education.
"Your party has no plan. It's 17 days before the election," said Naqvi.
"We're rolling out our platform in pieces," responded Naidoo, with O'Donnell breaking the tension with a playful quip that the Greens rolled out their platform in May.
O'Donnell criticized Naidoo's lack of action-oriented plans.
"I would encourage you to examine what the parties spend on and whether that money can be spent on education," he advised the audience.
The Green candidate emphasized the $16 billion deficit in Ontario — meaning the Green Party won't tackle education or a funding formula until their plan to balance the budget by 2015 is reached, only increasing funding in health care, but promising to keep from cutting education.
He blamed both the Liberals and the Conservatives for failing to redirect the proper funds for a revamped formula, challenging McGuinty's $200-million funding for road work between highways 174 and 417 and the NDP's "tough sell" of slashing HST from gasoline.
Both the NDP and Communist candidates said they would increase corporate taxes — the latter doubling the rates — to flush more into education.
Naqvi stressed the addition of 550 new schools in the province in the last eight years of Liberal reign on Queen's Park, with a 40-per-cent increase in funding in the Ottawa-Carleton and Ottawa Catholic school boards and a 8.5-per-cent decline in Ottawa-area school enrolment.
Naidoo called the Liberals out for the gap in infrastructure spending, adding that the centralized decision-making in Queen's Park suggests "a lot of the pie is dispersed before it gets to the school board."
Naqvi's claim that local school boards are swimming in surplus because of the McGuinty government's 3.5-per-cent increase in school board funding was refuted by public school board officials.
All-day kindergarten was another hot topic of dispute, with Naidoo pointing out problems with implementation in the last eight years.
Naqvi promised there would be "seamless transition" for parents from the full-day kindergarten program set to launch by September 2014 to a Liberal platform vow for an after-school program for six-to 12-year-olds.
He said the Liberals are fully committed to implementing an 2009 early learning report for four- and five-year-olds..
Dekker's absence incited an audience member to comment, "There is an elephant in the room. Where's the Conservative Party?"
The Progressive Conservative candidate declined the invitation, according to organizers.