The Toronto District School Board

Our education guide covers Toronto schooling broadly. This page is about the specific administrative history behind the board that runs most of it.

Six boards, one stroke

Before 1998, Toronto's public schools were run by six separate boards — the Toronto Board of Education, and the boards of East York, Etobicoke, North York, Scarborough and the City of York — loosely coordinated since 1953 by an umbrella Metropolitan Toronto School Board. That layered structure was dismantled by the Mike Harris government's Fewer School Boards Act, 1997, part of the same wave of provincial restructuring that amalgamated Toronto's six municipalities into a single city. The new Toronto District School Board took effect January 1, 1998 — the same day Toronto's municipal amalgamation took effect — with responsibility for over 300,000 students and almost 600 schools at its founding.

One of the largest in North America

Today the TDSB describes itself as Canada's largest school board, commonly cited among the largest in North America. Current figures put enrollment at roughly 230,000 to 250,000 students across more than 580 schools, with the board reporting students from over 200 countries of origin speaking more than 75 languages — a diversity that is itself a direct legacy of Toronto's postwar immigration waves.

Sources

• Toronto District School Board — About Us
• Legislative Assembly of Ontario — Bill 104, Fewer School Boards Act, 1997