By Sean Delaney
Matias de Dovitiis has been elected the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) trustee for Ward 4 Humber River - Black Creek. And de Dovitiis said simply that he ran to improve the schools in his neighbourhood.
“You talk to parents to see the opportunity kids have in our area, and it is common for parents to think kids will do better if they send them to other areas to go to school, and I think that’s unfair.”
de Dovitiis said he’s an immigrant kid who came to Canada to study and feels the opportunities present for kids in the neighbourhood during his youth aren’t there for them now.
“We spend a lot less money per child than we did four to five years ago,” he said. “And a lot of that money that isn’t there for special education and a lot of the other things we need. I see it in the struggles to hire bus drivers, teaching assistants and more. So there’s a number of things that are making it more difficult for youth now.”
He said that an education in Canada used to promise kids a better future than what their parents had, and he wants to fight for that. To ensure that children have better opportunities than what they’re being offered now.
“I am looking forward to working with parents to bring more to the schools,” he said.
But de Dovitiis also said he is aware that those goals will vary from school to school. And part of his job will be to improve the engagement and communication among parents and school leaders.
“Part of the work I want to do is the engagement process,” he said. “It can be difficult for parents to participate. We have a lot of parents working long hours. A specific goal for me is to look back four years from now and say, hey, we have many more people participating than we did in the past.
“This isn’t a one-person job, and we fix our public system by making sure people can communicate and participate in a meaningful way. I’m here to let parents, teachers, administration staff in schools, everyone, my main job is to tell them that they matter.”
To contact Matias de Dovitiis you can call: 416-395-8787
Or reach him via email at: Matias.deDovitiis@tdsb.on.ca