January 26th, 2022

As was announced last week, WRDSB secondary schools will be returning to a regular semester timetable. Many of our secondary students have yet to experience a regular semester schedule, so we thought it would be a good idea to remind our community of how a 4-period timetable works!

You will have 4 classes on your schedule each day. Each class will be 75 minutes long with 5 minutes travel time between classes or lunch between class 2 and 3. At this time lunch will continue to be 40 minutes long and there will still be pandemic protocols in place regarding where you can eat lunch at your school.

Updated Transportation Information for Secondary Students

STSWR has updated busing information to align with the modified bell times for semester 2. Transportation details will be available on Friday, January 28th. Please use our student login portal located on our website to retrieve your updated transportation information. Changes to routes will be effective the first day of semester 2, Thursday, February 3rd.

For greater security, our student login portal now requires you to have an account in order to see your transportation details; if you already have an account with us (e.g. to subscribe to notifications in the past) you can use the same credentials to login for transportation details. If you don’t already have an account, use our Student Login Guide to create one.

Instructional Support Days

Secondary schools will not revert to exam days with the Semester 2 schedule. Instructional Support Days will continue to be offered as they are currently scheduled on our ministry-approved school calendar. The dates for the Semester 2 Instructional Support Days are April 19 and 20, and June 22, 23 and 24.

Course Selection Reminder

We would like to remind WRDSB families that our students entering Grade 9 to 12 next year will complete course selection in February and March. Check your school’s website for important dates. Secondary students can also book an appointment with their school guidance counselor should they have questions about what courses they should select for next year.

Preparing for a new Grade 9 Program

In November 2021, the Ministry of Education announced that all schools in the province will implement a fully de-streamed and single-streamed Grade 9 Program. This new approach will ensure high academic expectations and less program restrictions for all our learners. There will no longer be a need for students to worry that they have chosen a ‘stream’ or course pathway too early in their high school experience, and more program pathways will be open to our students as a result of this change.

Two courses in Grade 9 will be brand new; Math (MTH1W) which was available for the first time this school year, and Science (SNC1W) which will start in the 2022-2023 school year. The other courses where students were streamed into either the Academic and Applied level will only be offered at the Academic level; French (FSF1D), Geography (CGC1D) and English (ENG1D). In Grade 10, all WRDSB secondary school students will also study Mathematics at the Academic level (MPM2D). WRDSB specialized programs (magnets) will use the codes noted above, with the exception of the sixth digit on the code which may differ to indicate the specialized program (ie: ENG1DW = IB English). For more information about course codes, check here, or connect with your school guidance counsellor.

Blended Learning Days

In order to prepare and implement the new Grade 9 program and support students’ achievement and well-being, our secondary schools will offer 4 blended learning days this semester: February 16, March 23, April 27, and May 18.

For students, these days will be similar to our Instructional Support Days, where students are not required to attend in-person, but will have learning provided through the virtual classroom and live meetings with their teachers. Attendance will be taken, but in-person attendance will be optional on these days.

We look forward to providing more information about de-streaming and single streaming work in Grade 9 and 10 as we develop our plans further.

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