Toronto’s mayor, Rob Ford, is in the middle of another controversy.
It happened last week. He was on the field with the high school football team he coaches, the Don Bosco Eagles.
The coach of the other team got into a confrontation with the referee.
Police were called in to deal with the situation.
That’s where the situation gets confusing.
The police called the Toronto Transit Commission (or TTC, which organizes Toronto’s buses and subways). Police asked the TTC to send a bus to the field to pick up Ford’s team.
Unfortunately, that meant kicking passengers off two buses—stranding them in the rain—and sending those then-empty buses to the field to pick up the high school football team.
The mayor said when the buses didn’t show up promptly, he called the head of the TTC and left him a message.
The team would have been picked up in less than an hour anyway, by their scheduled school bus.
According to this article published in the Globe and Mail, Mayor Ford said he was upset that people got put off the bus and into the rain.
He said that all he did was help the police by calling the TTC. He said it was the police—not him—who arranged for the TTC bus to come for the players.
According to a spokesperson for the police, the bus was called in to ensure the students’ safety following the confrontation, and to get the kids out of the rain.
TTC buses are sometimes rerouted in this way in the case of emergency situations.
Related stories
Read past TKN stories about Toronto’s mayor:
https://teachingkidsnews.com/2012/09/21/2-toronto-mayors-problems-follow-him-to-chicago/
https://teachingkidsnews.com/2012/05/06/mayor-rob-ford-has-bizarre-confrontation-with-reporter/
https://teachingkidsnews.com/2012/02/22/head-of-ttc-fired-toronto-council-divided-about-transit/
https://teachingkidsnews.com/2012/01/17/toronto-kids-learn-lessons-at-city-hall/
CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS
By Kathleen Tilly
Writing/Discussion Prompt
Rob Ford has been involved in many controversies since he became the mayor of Toronto, and TKN has reported on Mayor Rob Ford on many occasions. Take a few minutes to read the previous articles written about Mayor Ford and decide which situation upset you the most. Explain your thinking.
Reading Prompt: Extending Understanding
Once you have had a chance to read previous TKN articles about Rob Ford, reflect on the following question: do you think Ford is depicted in a way that is fair? Why or why not?
Primary
Express personal opinions about ideas presented in text (OME, Reading: 1.8).
Junior
Make judgements and draw conclusions about the ideas and information in texts and cite stated or implied evidence from the text to support their views (OME, Reading: 1.8).
Intermediate
Evaluate the effectiveness of both simple and complex texts based on evidence from the texts (OME, Reading: 1.8).
Grammar Feature: Sentence length
Sentences in this article come in a variety of lengths, ranging from short to long. A short example is, “It happened last week.” An example of a longer sentence is: “Unfortunately, that meant kicking passengers off two buses—stranding them in the rain—and sending those then-empty buses to the field to pick up the high school football team.”
How does the length of a sentence change how you read it and understand it?
