MUSKOKA, ON-A new form will allow parents to excuse their child from certain health topics.
The Trillium Lakelands District School Board (TLDSB) sent a form to parents earlier this month allowing them to decide what topics they can exempt their children from for the human development and sexual health curriculum.
Those topics include body development, personal hygiene and consent.
Targeted at grades one through eight, a parent could choose for their child not to learn something due to personal beliefs or religion.
In an interview with the MyMuskokaNow.com newsroom, Catherine Shedden the District Manager for Corporate Communications said that the form was part of the Ministry of Education’s plan for providing a safe learning space and to give “the parents the right to choose what educators teach their children.”
Shedden noted a section of the document which outlines the options a child may have if they are to be excused from certain topics. They may either, be released into the custody of a parent/guardian, they can choose to remain in the classroom during the exemption period but be assigned other work or activities and they may leave the classroom during the period and join another teacher or the principal.
Shedden said that parents must submit their forms two weeks before the health education begins.