David Lepofsky Email to Ministry of Education on TVI Training Meeting Today

Email from David Lepofsky to the Ministry of Education on TVI Training, June 17 2019

Thank you so much for meeting with Views and CNIB today to discuss the TVI training issue in Ontario. I confirm that we are to deal with Martyn as the lead on this issue. Martyn will get back to us by mid-July with an update on your efforts to raise this issue within the Government and with related organizations.

As we emphasized, we are eager for you to convene a meeting with us on the one hand, and with the key organizations needed to take part in a solution on the other. That would include the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Colleges and Universities, the Ontario College of Teachers, and one or more Ontario faculties of education that might offer a graduate level program to train TVIs. Such a meeting need not be preceded by any Government decision on action in this area. As well, we’d like an education faculty or faculties to take part even if they have not yet decided or even explored whether they might like to get involved in this area.

As we also emphasized, there is a crisis in this area in Ontario. Ontario is facing a shortage of TVIs. The two school board  key administrative/professional leaders in this area are both retiring this year. The status quo is not going to solve this. The OCT’s well-intentioned  current effort to improve the AQ courses for TVI training is no solution at all.

A strategy that we need should, among other things, aim to get an injection of a new pool of properly-qualified TVIs available for school boards as soon as we can, coupled with a longer term solution to ensure that we maintain a sufficient supply of them and that they are properly trained. Ontario should not lag far behind other jurisdictions as it now does.

We look forward to following up with you. We would like to see the Ontario Government put in place a strategy to deal with this as soon as we can. If done properly, it could be done in an economically sensible and efficient way.

Sincerely,

David Lepofsky, Advocacy lead for Views for the Visually Impaired