When something goes horribly wrong, a certain kind of silence descends on the school community. Not the emptiness-filled silence, but the kind that is heavy and full of questions that no one is quite sure how to ask just yet. In the weeks after March 9, when Lennox and Addington OPP responded to Bath Public School for what was initially described as a medical emergency, the Limestone District School Board found itself in a situation similar to that. A student in Grade 8 was transported to the hospital. The pupil failed to return home.
A police investigation, criminal charges against a young person, a public alarm, and a community left wondering how it got here were the kinds of events that school boards dread. A young person is now charged with two counts of indecent communication, criminal harassment, and indignity to a dead body. The Youth Criminal Justice Act protects the participants’ identities. There are still few details available regarding the actual death. However, the lack of clarity hasn’t lessened its weight.
By mid-May, the LDSB acknowledged that something needed to change and sent a message to families not only in Bath but throughout its whole jurisdiction, which included Kingston, Frontenac County, Lennox, and Addington. In response, the board invited Dr. Wendy Craig, a psychology professor at Queen’s University who has spent more than 40 years researching bullying, victimization, and what it truly takes to make schools feel safe rather than just saying they are.
Craig’s scope is purposefully wide. In order to determine what resources are available, what is effective, and—more importantly—what isn’t, she will look at school climate data, assess the frequency of bullying in LDSB schools, and speak with educators, administrators, and parents. “I’m going to be reaching out to the community,” Craig stated, “and get teachers’ and administrators’ perceptions about the kinds of resources they have, how confident and competent and capable do they feel about addressing these issues.” The final section is important. Competence and confidence are two different things, and a teacher who doesn’t feel supported is unlikely to catch what needs to be caught.
This story has a phrase that keeps coming up. “If you have this wonderful policy that says, ‘If you see a child struggling, you must follow steps one, two, and three,’ but that policy sits in a binder and isn’t accessible or enacted every single day in schools, then that policy is lacking,” stated Rob Rai, a senior executive with Safer Schools Together, in an interview with Global News. It’s the kind of observation that hurts because it’s visible in retrospect but not in real life. Schools in Ontario, and really all of North America, have accumulated policies like sediment, layer by layer, that are rarely tested until something compels them to do so.
The LDSB is not an underfunded, struggling board that is constantly in crisis. It has good employee ratings, serves more than 19,000 students in 70 schools, and as recently as late 2025, its EQAO results improved across all categories. That’s part of the reason this moment feels so uncomfortable. This board didn’t seem to be failing. This begs the awkward question: what specifically are other boards lacking if it can occur here?
According to Craig, she has never experienced a tragedy like this in her professional life. It’s worth pausing to consider that. Even after forty years of researching the most obscure aspects of school dynamics, something new has emerged. It remains to be seen if the review results in recommendations that actually change culture or in a polished report that is put away. The LDSB has pledged to engage the community in the process and make findings publicly available.
How long the review will take and how its findings will be applied are still unknown. However, there’s a sense that the board recognizes that the gravity of this situation necessitates more than just following protocol, at least for the time being. Honesty is necessary.
