Premier McGuinty visited with students and teachers at Mount Joy Public School today to help kick off the school year.

Education is an important part of the Open Ontario Plan. Since 2003, the McGuinty government has made investments to strengthen our schools. This has led to significant improvements including:

• Higher test scores in Grades 3, 6 and 9

• Smaller class sizes in primary grades

• 400 new schools built or underway and 17,000 renovations and upgrades completed or underway

• No labour disruptions.

The next phase of the Open Ontario Plan is introducing full-day kindergarten so that our kids get off to a better start in reading, writing and math. Full-day kindergarten begins today in nearly 600 schools. It will be phased in over time and all publicly funded elementary schools should have it in place by 2015-16.

Students who achieve early success in school are more likely to go on to postsecondary education and get a good job. This will help Ontario have the skilled workforce needed to compete in the global economy.