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By Igor Stravinsky (Former teacher, commentator)
Labour unrest is hanging over the start of the school year, but that hasn’t stopped Doug Ford from making a few changes to how the system will be run. He has mandated “parent support offices” be set up, with the directive that parents’ questions and concerns will be addressed, or at least acknowledged, within five days. This is a shot at School Boards, which are of course elected to perform that function, but after the social panic of George Floyd’s death in police custody and the Kamloops Indian Band’s false claim that the remains of 215 former students had been confirmed in the school yard of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, activists essentially took over the school boards.
Parents who were concerned about things happening in schools at the behest of the activists, like preferential treatment for kids of certain racial groups, the promotion of “affirmative care” for kids experiencing gender dysphoria, historical revisionism and casting people of European descent as genocidal oppressors (while others are characterized as victims) along with the general decline of academic standards and rise of unruly, violent, and criminal behaviour, were ignored.
But all this happened under Ford’s tenure as Premier, often in boards under direct supervision by the Ministry of Education. Ford created the problem, and now is proposing to fix it with these parent support offices. Maybe it will help a bit, we shall see, but Ford stood back and watched as the whole system, at every level, was completely captured by activist ideologies. It would take a long time to purge the system of that even if the political will existed to do so, and it doesn’t.
We’re told there will be mandatory financial literacy lessons, attendance and participation will count towards marks, and that most high school courses will have mandatory exams. All of that sounds good enough, but remember that it is the school principal who decides when a credit is granted. Whether any of this stuff has any real impact depends entirely on how he, or she, exercises that authority. That, in turn, hinges on how the school board senior administration evaluates the principal. Right now, the main metrics are credit accumulation and graduation rates, especially for certain target groups, who have historically been disproportionately likely to fail by those measures. There is no check box for ensuring a meritocratic and safe school.
Then there are the new history lessons. In grade 7 and 8, kids will learn about the experiences, development, and contributions of Black communities in Canada from the 18th through the 20th century. In grade 10 mandatory content will be introduced which will include, among other things, more Black history components.
Grade 7 and 8
The “key changes” documents can be found here. These 11 and 12-year-olds are supposed to do a lot of analysis, they are to gather and organize information and evidence and assess the credibility of sources and information relevant to their investigations. Okay, sure. But what are they being told?
Not this: In the year 1750, Black individuals made up approximately 0.52% of the recorded non-Indigenous population of what is now Canada. That number was still below 1% by 1800. By confederation, 1867, that number was still about 1%. After that, the number, as a percentage of total population, declined and sat at 0.2% in 1971. Then it slowly but steadily rose to about 4% which is where it sits today.
That begs the question: Why are students learning about the experiences, development, and contributions of Black communities in Canada from the 18th through the 20th century? Black people simply did not factor into Canada’s history much because there just weren’t many of them. In the context of a history lesson, if a Black person or community happens to feature prominently, by all means mention it. But that won’t happen often by sheer force of numbers.
The answer to that question is that today’s anti-Black-racist activists, who are pulling the strings at local school boards, think that the poor achievement in school of Black kids and the overrepresentation of Black people in Canada’s jails is the result of historic systemic racism. To support that view, it has to appear that Black people have been a significant population in this country since colonial times, but they were not. To the activists, though, facts don’t matter. What matters is convincing kids that Canada is a racist country.
Grade 10
The new grade 10 history curriculum can be found here. More Black history stuff. I was wondering if the main extreme political ideologies plaguing Canada today would get tagged for student analysis and study: Indigenous exceptionalism, critical theory, and gender ideology.
Indigenous exceptionalism holds that people whose ancestry links back to a person who lived in Canada before first contact with Europeans have inherent rights and privileges and the rest of us are mere “settlers” who owe rents and reparations. Is that a good way forward for Canadians?
Critical theory is based on the premise that society is organized into a hierarchy of identity groups based on race, sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity. People who are members of “historically marginalized” groups (anyone who is not a straight white man) are, according to this theory, entitled to preferential treatment. I guess underprivileged white kids are just out of luck.
Gender ideologues believe that sex is defined by something other than a person’s body’s reproductive strategy (egg/sperm production), but they can’t really say what it is. To them, it is more of a feeling. If you feel like a man, you’re a man. If you feel like a woman, you’re a woman. You can be both. Or neither. And it can change on a daily basis. Any wonder why kids are confused?
These extreme political ideologies are wreaking havoc on our society, especially on young people. But as far as I can tell, there will be no discussion of that in schools. These ideas, values, and beliefs are simply treated as irrefutable facts which are not to be questioned.
As always, the pragmatic Ford has done the political calculus and figures his parent support offices and orders to schools to deduct marks for poor attendance, along with mandatory exams, will resonate with most voters (at least among those who are paying any attention to the public schools). He once again gives the nod to the activists running the school boards to keep doing what they’re doing: Dividing Ontarians into competing tribes and dismantling the social order as we know it.
And I have to admit, it’s working. He has consistently stayed ahead of the Liberals and NDP in the polls for years even though his current approval rating is a dismal 21%.
He knows that to win in politics, you don’t need people to like you. You just need them to hate the alternatives more than you.
Thanks for reading. For more from this author, read Education Minister backs off Demands for Better School Attendance
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Ford has been Premier since 2018. The state of our schools is the biggest scandal of his government. The Progressive Conservative caucus has it in its power to dispose of him tomorrow and replace him.
Ford remains woke with little regard for academic values, but he tinkers with education when it is politically wise to do so. The focus on black-skinned students is counter to a meritocratic approach, yet it allows him to virtue signal.