Advocates urge Ontario to boost special education funding, report kids being excluded

Chantelle Bissaillion, left, and her daughter Amelia are shown in this undated handout photo. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Handout - Chantelle Bissaillion (Mandatory Credit)

For two, heart-stopping hours last Monday, Chantelle Bissaillion’s nine-year-old daughter was missing.

Amelia, who has autism, ADHD and anxiety, had gone out for recess and never returned to class. School officials called police and after what seemed like an endless search involving police cars, drones and a helicopter, her daughter was found close to home by a neighbour, Bissaillion said.

“The relief I felt in that moment is something I can’t fully put into words, but relief does not erase what happened, because the truth is, this should have never happened in the first place,” she said Wednesday at a press conference with the Ontario Autism Coalition.

Advocates are calling for greater staffing and funding for special education in the province in order to address what they say is a lack of adequate in-class supports to allow their kids to fully participate and be safe.

The coalition circulated a survey about the education system within the special needs community and found many families worried about special needs students’ safety at school. A rising percentage of parents said schools put their kids on a “modified schedule,” meaning they are allowed to attend less than full time. Many families also reported that their child did not have an appropriate placement to meet their support needs, and are excluded from some school activities.

Bissaillion said she does not blame her daughter’s school in eastern Ontario for Amelia’s elopement, saying they are doing the best they can with the resources they have.

“This is not just a safety issue, it is a system-wide failure,” she said.

“Teachers are doing everything they can with what they’ve been given. There are not enough (educational assistants) or support staff, not enough resources for children with complex needs. We need proactive safety measures. We need proper staffing levels so children are supervised and supported, and we need meaningful investment and special education so that the support is consistent.”

Funding levels not sufficient: Ontario Autism Coalition

Education Minister Paul Calandra has said the Progressive Conservative government has significantly increased special education funding since coming to power in 2018.

Kate Dudley-Logue, vice-president of the Ontario Autism Coalition, said it is not enough.

“Families, education workers and accessibility experts are delivering a consistent message: current provincial policy and funding levels are not sufficient to provide safe, stable and rights-based education to students with special education needs,” she said.

Dudley-Logue is also urging the province to better track exclusions, instances that include when a school calls a parent to pick up their child early because they can’t support the student’s behavioural needs or puts them on a modified schedule, limiting how many hours a day their child can be at school.

“Is that being tracked?” she said. “Nowhere that we can see.”

The Ottawa school that Shannon McNally’s seven-year-old son attends told her in February that he would be reduced to a two-hour school day because they did not have enough supports to keep him there safely for a full day, she said.

“We were told he needed more support, but to get that support, we had to prove it repeatedly,” McNally said.

“We were told to pursue a private psychoeducational assessment for several thousand dollars, so we did. Every step forward required relentless advocacy, meetings that led to more meetings, decisions that stalled, and timelines that kept shifting. Meanwhile, our child remained on reduced hours. Two hours a day is not an education.”

Owen, who has autism and other complex special needs, was recently placed in a specialized classroom but not before McNally had to quit her job to accommodate his modified, two-hour school day schedule.

At the same time, Owen is still waiting for access to publicly funded autism therapy. He was registered in the Ontario Autism Program to seek services almost three years ago, McNally said, but anecdotal evidence gathered by the autism coalition shows the wait time is around five years now.

NDP education critic Chandra Pasma said the families of Owen and Amelia and thousands of kids like them want their children to be able to receive an education.

“They deserve to be safe at school, to be supported and included, and so to (Premier) Doug Ford and (Education Minister) Paul Calandra, I just want to say: meet with these families personally,” she said.

“Sit down with them, interact with them, hear their stories, and then do the right thing and properly fund special education.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 29, 2026.

Allison Jones, The Canadian Press