Black-Focused Schools: Progressive or Segregationist Thinking?
The vote was 11-9 in favour of black-focused schools. This opened the door for a new policy to be put in place.
For the last couple of years now, the Toronto Board of Education has been grappling with the idea of piloting black focused schools, that would have an education system styled online the lines of what is used in the Caribbean and Africa in order to tackle the issue of the drop out rate that is prevalent amongst teens of colour, namely those of African and Caribbean descent.
The concerns about the current system included thoughts that the classrooms are suffering from over-crowding and struggling black students aren’t able to get the attention they need from teachers and hence are feeling defeated, For that reason, they drop out. There are other concerns, but the main concern was to address the higher rate of drop out compared to other students. There are other factors involved such as the home environment that these students come from. The students may come from an impoverish home and may lack the resources to succeed academically. There are many reasons.
Some parents wanted change because as many of 40% of black students are dropping out of high school, never going on to achieve a post-secondary education, which is needed in order to get anywhere in today’s world regardless of one’s background. Without that diploma, even the brightest are stuck in a dead-end or worse.
However, there are still parents who are oppose to it, like Loreen Small, the mother of Jordan Manners, a teen who was fatally shot at his school, C.W. Jefferey’s last May. She had come out stating that instead of developing a black-focused school that she would rather see teachers receive help in teaching in a multi-racial classroom. She had even gone as far as to label the move as ‘segregationist’.
“This black school thing … it ain’t right,” she told trustees, saying teachers need more help to engage with students in multi-racial classrooms.
“Don’t propose it – Martin Luther King thought we could sit at the front of the bus together,” pleaded Loreen Small, whose son was shot dead last spring at his school in northwest Toronto.
“My son died at C.W. Jefferys in 2007. If we can all just come together and be as one,” said an emotional Small, who broke down in tears in the hall after her presentation.
“If black kids need to graduate, let’s get teachers in there and learn how to interact with black kids,” she said.
Despite the pleas and warnings issued by some, the motion was still passed. Those who had favoured the motioned hailed it as the start of a new era. The motion included a plan to:
- Open an Africentric alternative school in 2009.
- Start a three-year pilot program in three other high schools.
- Work with York University to improve school achievement.
- Develop a plan to help failing students.
While in theory is sounds like it might work, the concerns about segregation isn’t completely unfounded. It would reduce the exposure of students to other students of unique backgrounds. It wouldn’t be do any favours for a society that prides itself on being a multi-cultural patchwork of rich cultures brought together to progress as humans.
“I just feel being with a mixed group of people is better, you know, you get to learn different cultures, different aspects of different people, the way they live,” said Grade 10 student Terrin Smith-Williams.
Strange, that despite opposition during the Ontario General Election last October in which John Tory’s Progressive Conservatives suffered an overwhelming defeat, with Tory not even gaining a seat despite being party leader because of the proposal to increase public funding for religious schools that this motion for black-focused schools would go through. Especially when there were many cries about how the funding of religious schools would increase segregation along religious lines, that this was given the go-ahead.
To go ahead with such a measure appears to be contrary to the general opinion of the voting and tax-paying public who’s sentiments seem to point toward a singular system where there is no one excluded for any reason.
There are other ways of dealing with a system that is failing certain students, and it starts with eliminating funding for the Catholic school board. They are permitted to exclude students because of religion despite being publicly funded and that in itself is just wrong in this day in age.
With the funding that would be reclaimed from privatizing this board of education the public school board would be able to effectively lower the number of students per classroom, increase resources and hire more teachers and be able to address the needs of students who are struggling. It would allow the public school board to address a key point of the plan for the black-focused schools, which is to help students who are failing by developing a plan to give them a fighting chance.
The same funding would be better spent allowing students to choose an academic education or one that is focused on developing skills through a vocational programme that would see them eventually placed in apprenticeships.
Some students will still drop out but at least more will stay in school and will be in a culturally rich environment where they aren’t isolated from their peers unless their behaviour is a danger to their peers.
Of course, not everyone sees it this way. So, they need to experiment to learn that some times just because something seems like a good idea in theory and looks workable on paper that in practise it is doom to fail. On the other hand, it could very well work, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t change one fact, that on the surface, this appears to be segregationist.
Toronto trustees vote in favour of black-focused schools
Board okays black-focused school
Stumble It!
January 30th, 2008 at 11:43 am
I agree that segregation is a step backward. The black community fought so hard to be able to vote, to use the same drinking fountains, sit wherever they like on a bus, and be seen on television. This proposal suggests they were happier the way things used to be.
The school board needs to adapt to suit its students, but the students need to adapt to the real world as well. What expectation will we be setting if we give these kids everything they want and then set them loose in the world? Seems to me that’d only be delaying, and compounding, the problem.
I say we should spend extra money on our current educational infrastructure and revisit some of the curriculum. It’d be nice, for example, if students were assigned homework to research great people in 2 ethnicities that are not the student’s.
January 30th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
You’re right on two accounts that yes students need to be prepared for the real world and that the school board needs to adapt to suit the students. It’s a two-way deal. The school board needs to provide an environment ideal for learning that still allows the students to be prepared for the pitfalls of the real world.
I disagree that the students should be assigned homework like that. Instead, course work should be uniform for all, though school, with each subject presenting work done by people who have made significant contributions to society, with the assignment being to research something specific NOT covered in class.
January 30th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I never said that all students shouldn’t be assigned that homework. Ethnic studies and whatnot.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:00 pm
You are calling for the elimination of Catholic funding and want all kids to be welcome in all publicly funded schools? What about the kids who have to try out for the many arts and sports-based schools? Auditions have been going non-stop for the past few months and parents are anxiously waiting to hear if their kids are in? Etobicoke announced another school for the arts this week – more auditions! Are you calling for the elimination of the Native schools? The few funded Protestant schools that Wynne called “anomalies”? The Gay-Lesbian-Trangender High School? French schools? French Immersion? Gifted programs? We have 2 specialty schools which focus on anger management problems – the kids learn half a day and do interactive activities and outings, like bowling, the other half.
We all pay education taxes, no matter what our school choice. If a kid goes to arts school instead of public school and it costs no more why should anyone care?
Winnipeg Free Press just posted:
* In Winnipeg, roughly 225 students attend the Children of the Earth School, an aboriginal-focused high school that opened in 1991.
* The school, which in 2005 made Maclean’s Magazine’s list of the country’s top 10 high schools, offers Cree and Ojibway classes to its mostly aboriginal student body, and roughly 75 per cent of grads go on to post-secondary school.
* Winnipeg is also home to Niji Mahkwa School, a nursery to Grade 8 school with an aboriginal focus. Roughly 310 students attend the school, which opened in 1994.
Personal note:
I fully support all alternative so long as they raise the kids’ self esteem, keep the kids engaged, are relevant to the kids and families who support them and have staff who are committed to the school. A common focus creates a bond between staff, students and their families – it does not matter if the focus is arts, sports, language, culture or religion.
The many alternative schools across Canada are highly successful. One third of Ontario’s publicly funded school are Catholic, many others are French. We have over 100 Specialty schools, many of which are arts and sports-based, with plans to have 100 more.
The Africentric school model is culture/spiritually-based; it is not FOR Blacks, it is ABOUT Blacks (it will be focused on one of the many black cultures)
It should not matter what a school’s focus is – Basketball or Basketweaving, makes no difference to me! The key is that the kids want to be there and are learning the basic curriculum in addition to the school focus.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Programmes that handle the advancement of skills are a good and necessary part of education. Specialised programmes are great, and should be there for all. Schools that have a focus based on religion or ethnicity shouldn’t be publicly funded because it doesn’t focus on the advancement of skills.
There is no problem with funding public schools with offer art or enriched programmes. Some students are more qualified than others. They should not be stopped from excelling.
To fund religious schools for example is silly because that’s less funding over all for those concerned. If you have specific programmes accessible to all in a public system that hand out the spots in the programme based on merit are in practise more fair because it takes into account skill and not something as frivolous as religion.
French-only schools make about as much sense as English-only. Schools should offer French as a single class along a primarily English programme with the inverse existing beside it as the immersion programme. Which sounds like something that was done at the elementary school I went to.
To ask specifically for a school that does something rather than seeking to work on the current system seems to be just ignoring a problem rather than fixing it.
The problem isn’t always the school, it’s also the attitude brought in by the students from home and that gained from their peers.
Yes it looks good on paper but is it really a solution or just something for people who don’t have the patience to work on a problem that effects everyone and not just members of X-group?
Giving specialised schools to all groups who want it makes no sense in a society where we wind up working with different people with unique backgrounds and being isolated doesn’t aid in that one key area of life. Even if you receive the best education at a school that has a highly specialised focused, if you don’t have a diverse population, you lose that, especially if you live in a neighbourhood where everyone has the same background.
But to send your child to a Catholic school, that at the elementary level doesn’t permit anyone but Catholics in and expect your child’s education bill to be footed by the taxpayers is simply foolish. Why should we pay for a child to be taught religion?
A singular public system with options (speciality programmes above the primary levels) would work, where all students have equal access based on skills and their abilities.
You’re right about the academic focus. That should be left up to the student but the school shouldn’t expect funding if it’s religious, period. It shouldn’t expect funding if it has a focus based on a certain culture or ethnicity.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:47 am
We are all taxpayers: those who value religion and those who do not. This discussion is supposed to center around ‘education’ not who gets their vision of school choice and who does not. As long as the kids are getting a solid education in the Ontario curriculum we should not be dictating who’s choices are respected. Faith-based education is steeped in character development, creating positive self esteem and teaching a contructive value system. Why should the general curriculum of math, science etc not be covered by the parents’ tax dollars in a faith-based school?
We live in a country where provincial and federal governments hand out heritage grants for international languages and cultural programs. Multiculturalism is supported and funded.
One third of Ontario’s publicly funded students attend fully funded Catholic schools. Our Premier went to a funded Catholic school as did his kids and wife (who continues to teach at one.) McGuinty has publicly stated his opposition to faith-based education and publicly funded faith-based education – how hypocritical is that?!
A non-partisan branch of the UN composed of an international committee of judges has rules twice (and is preparing to rule again) that Ontario is discriminating against non-Catholics by continuing to fund only Catholic schools. Canada is in violation of international human rights laws on this issue.
Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and BC partially fund all faith-based schools with the parents paying the religious component. Newfoundland and the Maritimes do not fund any faith-based schools. Ontario must choose: funding for all, funding for none or partial funding for all.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:53 am
BTW: “anonomous” was a mistake, must have pressed enter and got posted. I’ve been called a lot of things but… coward? Never!
Gila Martow
EDIT – I fixed the earlier post and put in your name as entered here.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:09 pm
I dislike the idea of seeing my tax payer dollars paying for students to go to a religious school. I happily pay for students to go a public system. A public system can instill good values in students. It can build character and esteem. It can do the same thing as a religious school; almost everything except educate in spiritual matters.
By expecting the tax payer to foot the bill is ridiculous because spiritual development as well as one’s religious experience is something that should be pursued in one’s persona time, not while one is supposed to be learning.
This to be violates the principle of the separation of church and state.
Maybe I would be more open to it if there weren’t concerns about students being taught creation, or being deprived of literature because the board thinks that it is “atheist” (see: Halton School Board and His Dark Material Series). Or that it would affect the type of information available during sexual education or the refusal to participate and make it easy for female students to receive the vaccination against Cervix Cancer.
Are they going to get the right information when it comes to sex in a religious school, especially one like the Catholic one, where there is much at stake if the students aren’t given the right information. Or are taught that anything but heterosexuality is unnatural and it effectively deprives students of other sexualities of the information they need and damages their self-image.
Removing the funding to me is the right thing, rather than expanding the funding. Of course if the funding is expanded, how would fair when people want it for every kooky faith there is out there?
Imagine for a minute the outrage that would exist if Atheists demanded their own school board, where they would send their children to be taught. Yes, some people wouldn’t object, but then there are many religious factions that would because they would claim that these children are being indoctrinated (kettle calling the pot black)…
As for religious needs, there is nothing that says students can’t get prayer rooms or have kosher or halal items added to the school menu. Or allow students to form clubs. I was at a public high school that allowed for the Muslims, Christians and Jews (and any one else) to form a club based on their faith. When I was in grade 9, I remember two of my friends hosting the Christian Fellowship group meeting on Thursdays and the school never stopped it.
February 18th, 2008 at 1:02 am
If you are uncomfortable with faith-based education don’t send your kids. I am sure you can imagine there are many who do not support the idea of a gay/lesbian/transgender high school, yet Toronto has one!
The reality is that the first schools were all faith-based and developed by religous communities. Almost all of Canada’s schools were considered faith-based (mostly Protestant and Catholic) until the 1970′s. I think it is generally accepted that most parents would no longer choose faith-based education for their children – but deny public funding for those who do seems extreme. Especially since Ontario fully funds one-third of its students in Catholic faith-based schools. Especially since Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and BC subsidize faith-based education.
This is about School Choice – either interest groups are all funded or none should be funded.
It has not been proven that schools which focus on particular religions or cultures produce less valuable members of society – quite the opposite. The Fraser Institute has demonstrated that schools which have a focus – be it arts, sports, language or culture – have students and family members committed to the school’s success. Successful schools have successful students!
February 18th, 2008 at 8:40 am
I wouldn’t send my kids. That’s one thing we both agree on. However, what I’m uncomfortable with is my tax payer dollars going towards religious education.
That’s why I’m in favour of not funding any school that has a religious focus. A school with a secular focus, ie: sports, arts, language to me is a better choice. It’s still focused but it doesn’t focus on religion, which to is good for academic choice.
To me religion is entirely a personal choice and should be between the person, their ‘god’ as applies. It shouldn’t be publicly funded. If people want private schools that focus on religion then it’s their choice.
However, if students wish to form a club that has a religious focus in the school, they should be able to. The high school I went to allowed for these clubs to exist. It gave religious students a chance to meet together and discuss their religion and spirituality.
February 23rd, 2008 at 9:22 pm
The problem, Bianca, is that one third of Ontario’s publicly funded students attend faith-based Catholic school with no immediate signs of change. It is not YOUR tax dollars that fund these kids in faith-based schools it is THEIR tax dollars; these kids would be funded in a secular public school with the same tax dollars. Ontario has been debating this issue since Catholic funding was extended to include past grade nine (which is not guarranteed in the Constitution)in 1984.
Since McGuinty is not willing to even discuss eliminating funding for Catholic schools we must address the issue of equity. The UN Human Rights committee has ruled twice that Ontario is discriminating against non-Catholic communities, putting Canada in violation of international laws we signed.
As we both agreed, you might not want to send your kids to faith-based schools BUT I would expect you to respect those who do. I respect all choices in education so long as the general curriculum is taught and standards are high… shouldn’t you?
February 23rd, 2008 at 10:00 pm
It’s not funding the students that is the problem. The problem is the type of education that is being funded, and in this case, it’s faith-based, which say to me that the church (or whatever you want to call it) and the state (or in our case, province) is not properly separated. We boost a secular system but yet there is still a connection between church and state, which doesn’t favour those who have beliefs that differ.
I respect choices as well, I just don’t support the idea of paying for two different school systems when funding two leaves one or both struggling for adequate funding, and having to slash programmes because there isn’t enough money to go around.
One public board means fewer bureaucratic positions over all and no discrimination because there is equal access to the same basic education, with programmes that address the academic needs of students who need a challenge or those who need help.
Ok… I’ll humour you.
Let’s say for a moment that we really did allow for faith-based schools to exist, how would the funding be determined? What would make one faith deserving of funding while another not? And what of students who want to go to the same high school as friends but can’t because of certain barriers?
And in those faith-based schools, lets say a student being sent doesn’t believe in that horse manure but his/her parents do and tp them, its important to send the child to this school rather to one that reflects the child’s beliefs, would they be obligated to pray when prayer is done, or would they be forced, trumping their rights to abstain?
With an exclusively secular system where no religion is involved, students would be free to have their own religious clubs, being free to believe as they will, with their religious education coming from the most important place, through their relationship with their spiritual side and any guidance received from someone their share a close bond with.
February 24th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
I would like to remind you that Canada is not based on a separation of Church and State, as is the U.S. We fund all sorts of cultural and religious celebrations through government heritage grants.
Quebec and all provinces west of Ontario manage to provide funding for faith-based education, with no crisis and no rulings of discrimination by the UN. Quebec provides approximately 60% funding for all faiths’ schools. This is fair since the general curriculum only is funded while encouraging parents to send kids to fully funded public schools.
You ask how we would determine which faiths to fund – the same we determine which faiths get tax receipts for dues and donations! Only faiths which are on the federal government registry of recognized faiths (Wicket is newly added, Satanism is absent) should qualify.
If all of the large provinces, excluding Ontario, manage to partially fund all faiths’ schools in a reasonable manner, why can’t we? Why is it acceptable for one third of Ontario’s public students to attend Catholic schools, when only the elementary grades are Constitutionally guarranteed, while all other communities must pay education taxes AND fund their schools.
The Jewish community has been asking these questions for over 40 years. The common answer is that the Catholics should lose their funding (still no political will in that department) or that this is the way it’s been for 150 years so that’s “history”.
Sorry, I don’t buy it! Associated Hebrew Schools opened its first branch in 1907 and is celebrating its 100th anniversary with no funding (100 or 150 years is not so significant!) Jewish communities all over the world have historically managed their own schools which are well regarded.
Education taxes are supposed to be about education. So long as a great education is provided and any government guidelines are met all schools should be funded. (Guidelines could include instruction in other religions, open enrolment, interactive programming with other schools, etc)
All your suggestions are wonderful, including religious clubs and programming in public schools. These ideas, though, should not replace the funding of faith-based schools which are a completely separate concept and entity. After all, all those kids in arts-based schools could attend their local public schools where there is instruction in the arts, albeit for fewer hours!