What I Told The Parents of Don Valley West
As Their Prospective Trustee...
Re: Invitation to all candidates for Don Valley West Trustee
-------- Original Message --------
Subject:Re: Invitation to all candidates for Don Valley West TrusteeDate:2025-01-23 02:38From:adamgolding@adamgolding.caTo:NSS School Council <nss.school.council@gmail.com>Cc:[redacted]
Thank you for your email! This is what I was already sending around:
"I'VE DEVOTED MY ENTIRE LIFE TO EDUCATION: And now I'm devoting it to you as your new school board trustee -- if you vote for me February 22nd, February 23, and March 3rd in Don Valley West!
Stay in touch with me throughout the election period and afterward as I've always prided myself on building policy from grassroots suggestions and real problems people face -- tell me your problems with The Toronto District School board and we'll discuss solutions we can implement after victory -- which brings me to one other matter: please donate to this campaign as I'm a regular person just like you struggling to get into the system so we can all get representation.
--
adamgolding.ca
ultimatecoders.com
“What’s missing from this TDSB Platform?”
TEACH CODING EARLY (SK-12)
EXTEND RECESS (AND THEREBY REDUCE MEDICATION)
REDUCE CLASS SIZES (EVERY YEAR)
NO COPS IN SCHOOLS
NO PHONES IN SCHOOLS"
On 2025-01-21 21:10, NSS School Council wrote:
Good evening,
Northern School Council would like to help educate the families of our students about the upcoming Trustee by-election. We are inviting all candidates for trustee to answer the questions below. We will share the answers with our parent community.
1. What makes you qualified to be a Trustee in the TDSB?
My unique combination of political and educational expertise, especially in the area of teaching artificial intelligence to children (SK-12), as well as teaching advanced music theory and piano improvisation to all ages, and my extensive education -- in short, here is my resume: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZFiqMpEozig2mTsmcFN5UL8UM68c558F
I've taught for 25 years for 15 organizations including placements at many public and private schools throughout the GTA, and abroad, teaching tech camps at Harvard, Yale, GWU, and UofT: my alma mater where I was also a 2-term president of the Cognitive Science & Artificial Intelligence Students' Association @ UofT [cogsci.ca] before running for council and working intensively on campaigns for Singh and Horvath. The municipal party I co-founded garnered nearly 15,000 votes throughout southern Ontario in its first election, and I was the median candidate in the 14-way race for City Ward 11, in my first run, on a shoestring budget without phone or door-to-door campaigns, or progress Toronto support, while operating independently from the NDP.
As Centre Director of ultimatecoders.com I offer in-school programs and online coding classes anywhere in the GTA, including in Don Valley West, not just at our after-school drop-in centre in The Junction, and we plan to expand to more bricks-and-mortar schools throughout the city.
I will apply Computer Science and Political Science to fix the bugs in the system, whether it is your child's code, or the school board's latest buggy policy! ;-)
2. What is your connection to Don Valley West?
My late father André Robert Golding taught at Don Mills Collegiate nearby, before his untimely death from lung cancer when I was only one year old -- one of his unfulfilled aspirations was to teach teachers how to teach, at OISE, as he was of the conviction that none of them knew how to teach, and I held this conviction, passed down to me via my mother, throughout my own extensive education, studying at every turn how to improve education. Today I teach teachers, and parents, how to teach coding to their kids!
I have frequent business just south of the riding teaching at Rose Park Jr in my home riding, the other "Ward 11", where I also teach piano and livestream from my home studio in Kensington Market, and have a vested interest in the future of the education system, especially in Don Valley West, where hope to start a family.
3. What do you see as the most important role of a school trustee?
Fairness and quality of education -- ultimately we must propose and vote on policy which makes schools fairer, and educations better -- especially by reducing class sizes, and extending recess. One way we can achieve this is by a temporary moratorium each year on new spending that does not improve the ratio of children to adults supervising. Improving this ratio is one of the core obligations of the school board.
4. What issues do you think need to be addressed most urgently?
My 'test platform' is below which includes what I personally believe is relevant, and I will be taking your feedback here at adamgolding@adamgolding.ca throughout the campaign and develop policy based on parent feedback. (Just as I did with the innovative and crowd-sourced #EvictJohnTory platform!):
"What’s missing from this TDSB Platform?
TEACH CODING EARLY (SK-12)
EXTEND RECESS (AND THEREBY REDUCE MEDICATION)
REDUCE CLASS SIZES (EVERY YEAR)
NO COPS IN SCHOOLS
NO PHONES IN SCHOOLS"
The google document is here which will reflect any updates throughout the campaign: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MA-7phI4o3z7KHpsx7rp5dLPDnptbZ6ykHMRo8Oo_DE -- you can also just find it at adamgolding.ca! :-)
5. If elected, how much time are you prepared to dedicate to this position? How do you anticipate spending this time?
I am always working non-stop on education -- on my own and everyone else's. Teaching takes about half of my work-week currently, leaving the other half for trustee work, which dovetails nicely with my natural obsession with local politics.
6. Are you affiliated with a political party?
I am running for the TDSB as 'a true independent', and prefer the 'non-partisan levels' of TDSB and council races to the groupthink of any party's ideology, but a short political history:
1. lifelong NDP & Liberal voter
2. 10 years in student politics @ UofT including 2 terms as student president of CASA, "The Cognitive Science & Artificial Intelligence Students' Association", which I expanded dramatically: www.cogsci.ca
3. Was recruited into the then-existing Pirate Party of Canada based on my online activism against intellectual property, and studied voting software, and voting systems, intensively
4. When Trump was elected I quadrupled how much of my research time was spent on politics
5. Began activism in earnest as one of the many co-founders of TorCH: The Toronto Coalition for Housing
6. Began paid work for the NDP doing voter ID nationwide for Singh and Fundraising for Horvath, volunteering for Jessica Bell locally
7. co-founded NDP splinter-group "The Municipal Socialist Alliance" for my council run: socialistalliance.ca
8. Am the outgoing NDP Labor Liaison for University-Rosedale
(Where I developed an innovative proposal to convert the party from being a corporation to being a worker-cooperative.)
9. Currently seek the NDP Nomination one riding over in the fight against Chrystia Freeland, just in case...
7. Do you have any endorsements?
See some endorsements from my last run for council at municipal.socialistalliance.ca/candidates There are many other pledges not listed including The Policing-Free Schools Initiative, whose demands of the MSA last time around are part of why I include "NO COPS IN SCHOOLS" in this platform...
While I have not asked them about my platform, I have taught for 15 organizations, in addition to my other leadership roles:
Arcadia Academy of Music
UofT
Ryerson
Digital Media Academy
Creative CADWorks
Anarchist Piano Lessons (Owner & Operator)
T-Rox Music Academy
The Socialist Alliance (Training Volunteers & Political Candidates)
BrightChamps
Little Fingers
Genius Camp
Team Jagmeet! (Volunteer Lead)
[redacted] Synagogue (Independent Contractor)
Ultimate Coders (Centre Director)
The Leacock Foundation
I have had many professor, student, and employer endorsements along the way as regards my teaching ability and commitment to education, and the education system.
We are also encouraging all candidates to host at least one virtual meet-and-greet for Northern families (most families find that weekday evenings are best). If you would like to do so, we are happy to share the text of your invitation in our weekly Parent Post which typically goes out on Wednesday afternoon. You will be responsible for providing your own web-link to this meet and greet.
How much lead time do you think is ideal? I can do 9pm on Zoom any Wednesday except the last Wednesday of the month, as I am hosting a new music event those nights! (Stay tuned...)
Best of luck in your campaign!
NSS School Council
Thank you so much for your engagement and initiative being the first organization out of the gate to poll us!
Sincerely,
Adam Golding
--
adamgolding.ca
ultimatecoders.com (Centre Director)
PS please donate I need $400 for a robocall... ;-)
—
donate @ adamgolding.ca