Ford gov kept DEI curriculum despite pledging to scrap: Fraser Institute

Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s government has maintained many of the progressive features of the province’s school curriculum despite promising a “back-to-basics” overhaul.

Source: Facebook, Doug Ford

Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s government has maintained many of the progressive features of the province’s school curriculum despite promising a “back-to-basics” overhaul, according to a new report from the Fraser Institute.

The study, Analyzing the Ontario Curriculum: How Has It Changed?, compares curriculum changes from 2008 to 2025 and concludes that the Ford government’s updates have left reinforced equity and social-emotional learning elements first expanded under the previous Liberal government.

“Despite Premier Ford’s stated intention to return to a more traditional curriculum, the province’s official documents continue to emphasize diversity, equity, and inclusion as core principles,” the report states.

“Teachers are directed to use culturally responsive and relevant pedagogy and to integrate social-emotional learning skills throughout the curriculum.”

The findings challenge Ford’s 2018 election pledge to move away from what he called “social laboratories” in education and return to a more traditional focus on core skills.

The report notes that while the Progressive Conservative government introduced new content in mathematics, science and financial literacy, those reforms were accompanied by continued and sometimes stronger requirements for teachers to embed “equity and inclusive education” and “social-emotional learning” in daily lessons.

For example, the 2020 math curriculum includes a section requiring “learning related to the development of the student’s social-emotional learning skills,” a theme that the report says is “virtually unchanged from the previous Liberal government’s approach.”

“Ontario’s updated curriculum has added STEM skills and financial literacy, but these updates have not diminished the prominence of progressive priorities such as culturally responsive teaching and equity-based instruction,” the authors write.

The Fraser Institute concludes that “the Ford government’s curriculum looks much the same as the one it inherited,” suggesting the province’s schools continue to operate under many of the same equity-driven principles as before.