Ontario elementary teachers' union calls on province to address mental health crisis worsened by COVID-19

The Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario is calling on the province to invest in what it is calling an ongoing mental health crisis in schools.

Education union officials say conditions in the classroom will continue to deteriorate unless something is done about it.

The elementary teachers union is painting a bleak picture in its latest release, describing staff and students being under "severe stress."

ETFO has more than 80,000 members, including teachers, early childhood educators and support staff.

Karen Brown, the union’s president, said the province needs to commit to investing in future of education in Ontario.

"We need true investments into the system so when we’re talking about evaluation, we’re looking at speech and language pathologists to help to be able to assess and early intervention so we can get supports for students," Brown said.

She said the classroom landscape has also changed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and that has resulted in increased challenges for everyone.

"Anxiety, stress, maybe coping mechanisms at home, family dynamics, you know a lot of family members lost their jobs during COVID, people had to be retrained, a lot of things were happening and students take on a lot of that stress," Brown said.

Local ETFO Rainbow Board President Liana Holm said in the north, one main challenge is the lack of resources.

"We need funding for that. We need to know where the supports are and we need to be able to direct families to where to find them and have people in our schools, helping our teachers and helping our kids," Holm said.

"We need psychologists, psychiatrists, child and youth workers, that would be really, really helpful for these kids who are in crisis and for teachers who are trying to manage it and trying to help people find resources because we just have less here in the north than we do in the south."

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CTV News reached out to the Ontario Ministry of Education, which replied with a statement:

"Our government has increased funding in mental health now by over 400 per cent, along with a 9 per cent increase in regulated mental health professionals in the last two years alone. Our government has funded the hiring of 7,000 additional education workers in our schools to better meet the needs of Ontario students."

For now, ETFO said supporting emotional development in students and staff is a "shared responsibility" as it continues to navigate how to address ongoing mental health concerns in education.