A Protest I Can Rally Behind!

On September 13, 2010 at 12pm, member organizations of One School System Network are planning a rally in Toronto to protest the public funding of Catholic schools in Ontario.  The event has been planned for this date as it is the first day of the two day international summit on education being held by the Ministry of Education.

In Canada, The Constitution Act of 1867 mandates that Catholic schools be publicly funded.  This has remained in the Constitution despite the fact that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms also prohibits discrimination based on religion. 

You can't have it both ways.  You can't provide full public funding to one religion's school system while denying it to others.  You can't publicly fund a school system that denies entry to students based on faith.  You can't publicly fund a school system that denies jobs to teachers based on faith.

The United Nations Human Rights Committee has even condemned Canada (1999) for discriminating in their providing of public funds to Catholic schools and not other denominations..  

The solution would seem to be to fund all religious schools or none.  If we were to fund all religious schools we would be taking funds out of the current public school system at a time when funds are desperately needed.  That leaves us the solution of funding none of them.  Keep the school system secular and public, available to all children regardless of faith and open to all teachers regardless of faith.  This would be following the lead of other Canadian provinces like New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, PEI, Newfoundland & Quebec.  Quebec for crying out loud!  Quebec which has statistically the highest percentage of Catholics of any province in Canada no longer publicly funds Catholic schools!!!

Come on Ontario - Get with the program!!!  Faith is personal and has no business in the public classroom.  This is why there are churches and youth groups and family gatherings.  If you want to raise your child in your faith, then feel free, but don't expect my tax dollars to pay for it.

While we're on the topic of my tax dollars, there is a misconception that needs to be cleared up.  Catholic schools in Ontario are fully funded.  This means that the funds are given to these schools in the same way and from the same coffers as the rest of the public schools.  When you fill out, on you property tax form, whether you "support" the public school system or the Catholic school system, it means which do you support politically, not to which do you wish your tax dollars to be applied. 

There was an excellent article called Canada's Dirty Little Secret in the journal Humanist Perspectives recently.  It was written by an Ontario public school teacher named Richard Young.  Mr Young does a phenomenal job detailing how the system works as well as how much money could be saved (or hopefully applied to the public system) if we stopped funding the Catholic schools.  I encourage everyone to read it.

Richard Dawkins also recently did a documentary on faith based schools in the UK which can be watched online.  I've only watched the first half so far, but have found it very interesting and fairly relevant to our current situation in Ontario.

My Thoughts on French Immersion

Note:  This was originally a note of mine on Facebook, but I thought I would add it to my blog (edited).

Over the years I have been asked by a variety of people, mostly parents, whether I felt French Immersion was valuable in my education. Here is my response:

Why I am glad I was in French Immersion

First of all, yes it was hard, but so was science and math and music. And yes, sometimes I hated French class, but no more than I hated school in general. The difference was that learning French was one of the few things in school that made me genuinely proud. I felt as though I had accomplished something.

Yes I had problems in school. I was an average student in ALL my classes. Very rarely was it because of the language. Usually it was because of the teacher. I hated science with Mr. A. I hated math with Mrs. B. I hated French with Mr. C. Does that mean I hated the subjects? Absolutely not!

And yes there were a few problems specific to language. One was grammar. It’s boring. No kidding. But even the most exciting courses have their boring parts. Second was the transition from French to English. That could have been done much better. Some students had no problem. I had some initial problems in math. Mr. D realized this and sat down with me to help. It was just a matter of translating a few words that I had only known in French. No big deal. My marks shot back up in math from that day on. Problem solved. This is a foreseeable problem and if handled in good time not a problem at all.

That foundation in a second language also gave me a better understanding of the English language. And, when I took Spanish in high school, there was a noticeable difference between the Immersion and Core students. The Immersion students generally picked up the language much more easily and quickly.

Let’s face it. We live in Canada (well you might not, but I do) and whether we like it or not there are two official languages. Knowing both can give you a pretty big leg up. And learning a 2nd language as an adult is very rarely an option.

As for not being able to converse in France, we had five exchange students from Nantes in my Grade Ten French Classes. They had no problem understanding us and vice versa. There were differences, but no more so than trying to speak English in Alabama. They [Alabamians] laughed at some of the things I said as well. But, in either of these scenarios, the versions were close enough that there were no significant language barriers.

(Note that the names of my teachers have been omitted as I don't want them retro-actively failing me)