Thornlea Secondary School

Great place to send your kids. Just Jane to watch them closely. I've caught them on occasion pushing ideologies, which is not their place to do so.

Ms. Niknaz is very friendly and helpful in the Friday evening Farsi Language Classes. At the first day of program I saw that it was a chaos but then she came and organized almost everything. She is a real manager! Mrs Mirarefi is also a very kind teacher that children love her. There are several nice volunteers working to organize the classes at this evening program.Thanks!

As a former student in this school, it's pretty obvious for me that the quality of education varies quite a lot depending on the teacher you get. On one hand, you get teachers that genuinely care about their quality of education. Dr. Manivannan, Mr Belchevski... the list goes on and on. And I want to say thank you to those teachers. However, If you're unlucky, you might get another type of teacher like Mr. Ramnarine Etwaroo, who does not care about what you learn and is unreasonably unfair to students. After several complaints to the principal last year and I'm still in awe to hear from my younger schoolmates that he is still in the position of teaching, and not changing his attitude at all. Now, I can go on a rant about how bad these type of teachers are. But I'm pretty sure there's already a review that explain the situation better. So I'll leave it to that. Overall, not your best choice of school to let your child to spend 4 years in. Quality of students that attends to this school is worrying, well, some of them. Not easy at all for transfer students to fit in. Barely any extra curricular activities, and bad guidance counselor. Other than that, everything is average.

Principal Joe FotiComp. Science teacher Ram EtwarooWe place our kids in the school’s hands to give them a good education where teachers are supposed to give them motivation and encouragement as well. However, my son, In Grade 11 has had a very frustrating, demotivating experience with Foti and Etwaroo.Etwaroo Keeps giving students assignments without having taught them on the subject. After continued efforts to ask the teacher for explanation and receiving none, my son complained to Principal Joe Foti. Nothing happened.Problem with teacher persists. I called principal to complain. He said he would sit in his class to observe. No feedback received from principal. 2nd call to principal to follow up. Response was that he sat in the class but didn’t feel there was anything wrong. My son said that the principal had never attended any of the classes. No support was received from Principal.At this point my son and I feel Principal is not interested. Kyan asked the guidance counselor if he could change the course but there was nothing else available. My son’s frustration with teacher increases and he started skipping the rest of the classes with this teacher.Last Friday teacher sends me email saying my son is failing the class then called me but I missed the call. I called back immediately and got voicemail. Left a message for him to call me back. No call received.Monday, 27th my son gets 1/40 for last assignment handed in. And no marks for other assignments handed in.My son and I went to see principal. He gave us no acknowledgment that we were even there and he didn’t care.When my son explained what happened, he said, “don’t ask me to change your grade”. I said that isn’t what we are asking. After repeating the whole issue with the teacher to the principal, I reminded him about my phone calls to him a few months back and I pointed out that I never heard back from him. He apologized for not calling me back but had no plan on what he was going to do next. He also mentioned that my son is one of the most polite and respectful kids which is why it is so surprising that only this one teacher gives him a hard time. The principal said he did sit in the teacher’s class to observe but after I spoke with another student he confirmed that the Principal never sat in any of their classes just as my son had told me the same earlier. This tells me the principal lies, is lazy and does not care about the students’ futures. He mentioned that only 2 students have complained.The same student above, told me that he also was given a 1/40 for the last assignment and when he went to speak with this teacher, he said, “Don’t give me a hard time or I will not give you any marks!” With this kind of threat, no wonder only 2 students officially complained - no student would have the courage to come forward and with a principal like Foti, students may be feeling that he isn’t going to do anything anyway so what’s the point?The children’s future is on shaky ground with these kind of educators.I look forward to hearing back from you on this matter at your earliest convenience.Kind Regards,Taz Teja

Terrible administrative staff, as well as horrible teachers, some who don't care at all, others who abuse their power (similar to certain cops' energy lol). Only reason I gave 5 stars is because of MR. MCCUTCHEON. Truly a god amongst men, and one of the best teachers to have ever touched this Earth. Not to mention the fact that he's a GENIUS, and funny too. I mean, what more could you ask for? If you ever have him as a teacher, get him a coffee for me, and let him know that his students still appreciate him, years after leaving. I could write pages thanking him, but to keep it short and sweet, thank you for being you. Love you Bart.

Never go to this school! The guidance never gave a reply, pushed back on almost all requests. Also, one of the math teacher even held a private donation in class, saying how much you donate impact what scores you'll get. Sent many emails to the school and also YRDSB, everyone was like kicking the ball.It's not education it's toxic...

Been here from 2005-2007 for Grade 12One of the best schools I have been to!Some of the teacher can improve!

This school is one of the best high schools out there due to the opportunities you are given. There's deca, French Immersion, the AP program, one of the best drama stages in the region with thousands of dollars worth of gear, ACAM and tons of clubs you can join (pretty much always something going on). The school is very well located (near a plaza, great fit hanging out or buying lunch or a quick snack) and there aren't separate lunch periods. The staff is nice. Definitely would recommend

It has 2 pickleball courts + 3 shared courts with tennis and pickleball