Catholic Trustees – Focus of Local Government Week

Leading up to this week’s “Local Government Week” provincial awareness initiative (Oct. 18 – 22), OCSTA President Patrick Daly sent a special letter out to all Catholic Trustees acknowledging their essential role in serving as advocates, stewards and political leaders for publicly funded Catholic Education in Ontario.

Catholic school board trustees are the only publicly elected official with direct responsibility for the education of children in Ontario’s publicly funded Catholic schools. To further highlight the important role of Catholic Trustees, President Daly referred to the following quote from the OCSTA publication Witnesses to Faith:

“Parents (Catholic ratepayers) entrust to duly elected trustees the responsibility for governing and implementing policies which assure Christ centred learning environments which support the virtues and values they teach in their homes … the Catholic community expects trustees to be persons of faith, with a vision of life that is centred on Christ and who have a sense of being called to Ministry.”

To support Catholic Trustees in their outreach to communities now and throughout the year, below is a link providing access to a customizable PowerPoint presentation that we invite trustees to use:

The Role of the Catholic Trustee

A Call To Serve – Messages from Trustees

As part of a provincial OCSTA initiative, Catholic school board Chairs were invited to share a brief message on video that details their perspective and experience answering the Call to Serve as a Catholic Trustee – click on the link below to view these videos:

Called to Serve

REMINDER: Trustee Code of Conduct Consultations

Ontario’s trustee and school board associations have been invited to participate in a consultation regarding Trustee Code of Conduct. Members are reminded to share their feedback in the online public survey. The indicated deadline for feedback is November 1, 2021.

The Association has been invited to participate in a stakeholder consultation session on this topic and will provide input on behalf of Ontario’s 29 Catholic District School Boards and 237 Catholic School Trustees.

Justice Peter Lauwers on Catholic Education – New Date

**NOTE DATE CHANGE TO NOVEMBER 29TH**

OCSTA is pleased to announce that our next featured speaker in the Catholic Education Leadership Speaker Series is former OCSTA Counsel, Justice Peter Lauwers.

On November 29th at 7:00 p.m. Justice Lauwers will be addressing our members and peers on the topic:

Catholic Education’s Strategy in the Light of Experience:
Thoughts on What Works.

Presenter: Justice Peter Lauwers

Prior to being appointed to the Court of Appeal for Ontario, Justice Lauwers was a partner at Miller Thomson LLP. He practised in the areas of civil litigation, constitutional law, human rights, and administrative law including education, municipal and labour law and appeared at every level of court including the Supreme Court of Canada where Mr. Lauwers successfully represented OCSTA for some of the Association’s most historic legal challenges.

WHEN: November 29th, 2021 at 7:00 p.m.

FORMAT: Virtual (Zoom) – no fee to attend

REGISTRATION: Click on the link below to complete the registration form.

https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZAlcOiqrDIpHNGoO2UrVOBGNH7yevTZsb0n

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining this OCSTA event.

If you have any questions about this session, please do not hesitate to contact Sharon McMillan, smcmillan@ocsta.on.ca or 416-460-7937.

Previous Recordings

For your information and convenience, we have uploaded to the OCSTA website, the recording from our most recent OCSTA Catholic Education Speaker Series presentation on September 22, 2021 featuring Fr. Stefano Penna. This video can be accessed at the following link (in OCSTA’s Members’ Centre):

https://www.ocsta.on.ca/members-centre/

You will require member login credentials to access this presentation – if you need assistance please contact Ashlee Cabral – acabral@ocsta.on.ca.