Adam Zivo: Tasha Kheiriddin wants to fix Toronto’s schools

Political commentator Tasha Kheiriddin says that the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) is dysfunctional, inefficient and mired in activism that distracts from the “nuts and bolts” of education. That’s why she’s running to be one of the organization’s trustees this autumn: to help restore common sense to a system that fails students of all backgrounds.

A seasoned lawyer and media professional, Kheiriddin is one of Canada’s most prominent conservative voices (and, not incidentally, a columnist with the National Post). She is also a 56-year-old single mother with a teenage daughter, which has given her a vivid glimpse into the dismal state of Toronto’s schools.

For four years, Kheiriddin has sat on the parent council of Rosedale Heights School of the Arts, where her daughter is a student. The institution offers specialized arts programs and uses a merit-based admissions process (e.g. auditions, portfolio reviews) to ensure that attendees have a genuine interest in — and aptitude for — the creative curriculum.

Between 2022 and 2025, though, the TDSB switched all of its specialty schools, including Rosedale Heights, to a lottery-based system whereby new students were admitted randomly, without regard for their merits or needs. This was done for the sake of “equity,” because merit-based admissions inadvertently favour richer (and whiter) families that can afford to prepare their children with extra classes and training.

Like many parents, Kheiriddin says the change was a disaster. According to her, the school often admitted students who had no real interest in the arts, taking away slots from youth who could actually benefit from specialized programming. When some of these students subsequently transferred out, new students were not permitted to take their place.

Worse yet, the lottery did not allow principals to arrange for special admissions in exceptional circumstances. When Rosedale Heights’ now-former principal Barrie Sketchley bent the rules to enroll a trans-identified student who was being bullied in another school, the TDSB retaliated by suspending him, Kheiriddin told me in an in-person interview last weekend.

She said she was frustrated by the system’s inefficiency and moral hypocrisy. Sketchly was beloved and had “given so much and created a welcoming environment” for vulnerable youth, yet the TDSB — an institution that “preaches inclusion and equity” — had disciplined him for “doing exactly what they’re supposed to want to do.”

Although the province compelled the TDSB to end the lottery system after two years, the failed experiment left Kheiriddin with a lasting appreciation of how ideologically-driven decisions erode student outcomes. Yet, it was only one of many failures that motivated her campaign to change the system.

“I have seen a lot of dysfunction in the board and how it operates,” she told me, emphasizing that basic maintenance and fiscal prudence seem to be a low priority for the TDSB.

She said that, when Rosedale Heights’ roof partially caved in, it took an “insane” amount of work to get the facilities staff to fix the issue. Stymied by bureaucracy and institutional inertia, everything moved at a glacial pace.

According to Kheiriddin, an underlying problem is that the TDSB relies on a “very short list of vendors for stuff.” She recalled how, at another school, staff wanted to bring a barbecue for their fun fair — and indeed even had someone willing to donate one — but were told that they had to pay $5,000 for an approved vendor, who did not even live in Toronto, to bring in a barbecue from out of town.

In her experience, the TDSB’s trustees seemed distracted by activist causes and social justice theatre. At one school board meeting, for example, the trustees spent two hours debating whether the word “co-ed” is offensive. “Why is that a good use of anyone’s time?” she wondered.

It seemed to be part of a larger trend: in British Columbia, for example, school boards are “also being criticized for being very activist, agenda-oriented — ideology-oriented versus education-oriented.”

In 2025, Ontario placed several school boards, including the TDSB, under direct provincial supervision and suspended their current trustees. Then, earlier this year, the province passed a new law limiting the authority, compensation and discretionary spending of all school board trustees. Among other things, the annual honorarium paid to a trustee is now capped at $10,000, rendering the position a de facto volunteer role.

Kheiriddin recognizes that, under this new status quo, her ability to push for reforms would be constrained as a trustee. Even so, she believes that practical leadership is still needed and that if the TDSB is governed by normal people like herself, rather than whimsical activists, the province might gradually transfer power back to its trustees.

Despite the province’s interventions, dysfunction remains endemic. Throughout her campaign, Kheiriddin has visited approximately 30 schools in her district and found widespread frustration among parents who are desperate for representation.

She recalled how, in one low-income neighbourhood, a first-generation Indian-Canadian mother lamented, in near-perfect English, the fact that her child could not read.

“She was so angry that the school system here is not as good as in her home country for her second language, which is our first language here,” said Kheiriddin, adding: “My main opponent is the status quo.” And then, with a sunny smile and disarming exuberance, she returned to knocking on neighbourhood doors.

National Post