Our petition to have government expand the subsidies to buy laptops for students reached 1000 signatures a couple days ago.

When that happened, I emailed a PDF to every politician in the province, federal and provincial, as well as teachers associations, principals and the news.

Shortly after the department of education sent out an email to parents with the previously detailed definition of the subsidies with an extra sentence between the charts - that parents will be able to submit their pay stubs from this year (with no additional information).

After some back and forth with the telegraph journal and with Minister Cardy, I can now say that they will be basing the subsidies on this years income! That means anyone who has experienced financial hardship from Covid to the point that their income will now be within the parameters for subsidy, they should be receiving it. This is Great news!

They have not updated the Parent Portal yet (it still only allows for people to submit their 2019 tax return) but I expect that to change in the coming days.

i know that this does not address all of the concerns that we are looking for. I also realize with it being this close to the start of the school year, there is little time left for the drastic changes that we had been looking for.

Many parents have already purchased laptops I doubt any further changes can be made in time.

To me, I am counting this as a win.

My intention is to mark this petition as a victory tomorrow morning.

Should anyone has a problem with that please reach out to me before the end of the day.

mikestephen3@gmail.com