After eight years in her Etobicoke community, Frida, her husband and her five school-aged children recently left Toronto to resettle south of the border.
Frustrated with the Toronto District School Board’s inability (or unwillingness) to stop the relentless bullying and antisemitism her children regularly encountered at Rosethorn Junior School, they decided to move to a Republican state where they believe their children will be much safer.
”I’ve tried so hard to make things better,” says Frida (who has dual citizenship). “It didn’t work.”
”I’ve been working to try to keep my children in a safe place and they (the school board) failed them so much… I’m devastated.”
Frida asked me to keep their true identity secret, even though she’s now gone, as she’s had to deal with some “very aggressive” people in her community.
A few weeks before she left Toronto, she published a heart-wrenching letter on social media bidding farewell to the community that didn’t protect her family:
Sadly, Jewish families in the TDSB are tired of the complete abdication of leadership when faced with antisemitism and bullying. (Read the letter below to TDSB staff regarding a situation at Rosethorn Jr School).
— Save Our Schools TDSB (@SOSTDSB) December 18, 2024
It’s been a complete failure from senior staff, trustees,… pic.twitter.com/cUIakmqAHi
She said what many other Jewish teachers and students have expressed privately: If the school board had meant business about creating a “zero tolerance atmosphere” regarding the behaviours experienced by her children, the outcome would have been vastly different.
”It is my hope from this day forward that the school and the leadership will reflect on what inclusion truly means, what safety truly requires and the vital role every teacher, staff member and council member must play in the assurance that this community shall remain safe and welcoming for all… No mother should ever have to endure the pain I have,” she wrote.
She was scared to publish the letter but felt she needed to share her story because she felt ultimately she “failed her children” for not protecting them.
Frida said the school took her children and turned them into “introverted scared puppies” and tried to resolve the issues with social work meetings.
TDSB spokesman Ryan Bird told True North all allegations brought forward to the principal were “promptly investigated.”
He said the principal and superintendent had been working with this parent “for some time” on a range of concerns. (He didn’t say which principal or superintendent as both changed over the course of the past year).
“It is a complex situation but one that has been fully investigated with some of the allegations not being substantiated and/or accurate,” Bird said.
“Others have been founded and multiple steps have been taken including speaking with students, their parents and additional learning opportunities.”
Frida tells a different story.
She said there was always bullying in the school but it escalated into antisemitic acts after the atrocities of Oct. 7.
When this past May some girls taunted her two daughters in the school yard with cries of “Free Palestine,” nothing was done.
When on the first day of this school year, one of her two daughters was called “white trash,” nothing was done.
Frida sent me copies of many emails back and forth with the principal of the school and the superintendent requesting something be done. But despite promises and nice words, the incidents weren’t really dealt with.
A July 8 e-mail from superintendent Alison Gaymes San Vicente (a she/her), tells Frida that the issue was “addressed with much seriousness and multiple steps” were implemented.
”We continue to be committed to interrupting and confronting racism, discrimination and hate,” San Vicente claims.
She also stated that the incident was logged in the TDSB Racism, Bias and Hate portal— an action which Frida says did nothing.
She said that her childrens’ teachers didn’t appear to know about the incidents either.
One of the issues appears to be that an understanding principal – who had Frida’s back – left, replaced by a seemingly inexperienced principal.
The superintendent for the area also changed last fall, leaving little continuity or accountability.
Another huge problem, of course, is the lack of serious consequences at the TDSB — meaning a ban on suspensions and expulsions.
In an email as late as December indicating her extreme frustration about the bullying her kids repeatedly encountered, Frida said getting the perpetrators to apologize is “inadequate without meaningful actions” as in having a bully “acknowledge the harm caused.”
Frida also wondered why the child’s parents were not involved in the process.
On every email she copied trustee Dan MacLean, who she said was mostly MIA.
”I didn’t have any emails (from him) that showed his support,” she said.
Because the issues were unresolved with her kids, parents started to call her “dirty Jew” and “racist” in the schoolyard.
The school council, which she’d once been on, knew what was happening but didn’t say or do anything.
”It started to wear at me,” she said.
I suspect it will get worse before it gets better considering the TDSB’s woke trustees — most of them without a brain in their heads — just voted to make DEI certification mandatory for teachers.
Education Minister Jill Dunlop and Premier Doug Ford have said nothing.
It’s incredibly alarming that while the new president of the United States, Donald Trump, talks about dismantling DEI, we in Canada (in particular Ontario) are going backwards.
Frida said when the school and school board started to bury the incidents under the rug and kept refusing to follow their own policies, she decided she’d had enough.
”They made everything a giant fight,” she said, reiterating there is no accountability at the TDSB.
”I moved to a place where people have to be accountable… a Republican state.”
