April 26, 2023

Board Statement

Waterloo Catholic District School Board Trustees represent citizens of Waterloo Region. The Board remains committed to providing a quality, inclusive, faith-based education with a goal of providing all students the opportunity to succeed and belong.

The Board of Trustees of the Waterloo Catholic District School Board does not support statements made by Trustee Wendy Ashby in social media posts.

The Board is aware of concerns raised by community members regarding the contents of the posts by Trustee Ashby and is doing its due diligence in ensuring that those concerns are heard. Whenever there are allegations of a breach in the code of conduct, the Board follows up with a review into those allegations.

At a Board meeting held on Monday April 24, 2023, a number of individuals were disruptive, causing the meeting to be briefly recessed. Waterloo Regional Police were called to ensure the safety of all those in attendance. No arrests were made, and no further police action was required. The meeting resumed and Trustees received the presentation from the meeting’s sole registered delegation.

The Board will continue to be accountable and accessible to our community, but we will not tolerate hate of any kind or disrespectful behaviour that is disruptive to public meetings.
There will be no further comment from the Board of Trustees at this time. Please refer to a separate statement issued by Trustee Ashby.

Trustee Wendy Ashby Statement

I apologize for my tweets that offended people and I apologize to my board colleagues for how this has impacted them.

Conversations about inequality are often uncomfortable.  As a Métis woman and in my professional role, I encounter these discussions regularly and part of these discussions is to challenge our existing systems. A great deal of my education and advocacy work is around understanding and furthering diversity, equity and inclusion.

I have decided to remove my Twitter account to ensure that my comments and advocacy will not be taken out of context, in the future.

I remain dedicated to continuing to work with my colleagues and our community to support all students.