Showing posts with label ontario election. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ontario election. Show all posts
Friday, September 28, 2007
More on Faith-Based School Funding
If this topic interests you, there is a fairly comprehensive article on the issue in today's Globe and Mail.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Faith-Based Schools - Part 2
I came across a couple of articles in The Hamilton Spectator today on the issue of public funding of faith-based schools. One is by Eveyln Myrie, Tory's school funding plan is complicated and the other is by Zeynep Basal,No time for religious ghettos in new world.
Check them out if you are interested in looking at the issue from the perspectives of a Jamaican-Canadian and a Turkish-Canadian.
Check them out if you are interested in looking at the issue from the perspectives of a Jamaican-Canadian and a Turkish-Canadian.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Public Funding of Faith-Based Schools
As a Canadian, I am proud of our multiculturalism. Although not a perfect policy, it reflects, I think, one of our defining characteristics as a nation. However, during the current Ontario election campaign, there is a policy being promoted by the Conservative leader John Tory that I cannot support. His election promise to extend public education funding to faith-based schools is ill-considered and divisive.
Currently, about 53000 children attend such privately-funded schools. Tory’s contention that the extension of funding will ‘bring them into the public tent’ and promote understanding and greater tolerance makes no sense to me. First, a public system, by its nature, is open to all, and at least in theory offers equality of opportunity. Faith-based schools cater to an exclusive clientele and refuse to hire those who do not share their beliefs or religious denominations. I doubt that would change were funding extended. One has only to look at the publicly financed Catholic system to see its discriminatory hiring practices which no one challenges them on. The fact is that an applicant must be a good practising Catholic with a note from the parish priest to even get an interview. Indeed, they even refuse to share school buses with them, even though transportation costs could be reduced significantly. Would it be any different with other faiths and denominations?
Secondly, Tory’s assertion that it will bring people together is a non sequitor. When I went to Catholic elementary and high school, I was rarely exposed to people of other faiths. How would the extension of funding result in anything different? Indeed, isn’t it likely that the current 53000 enrollment would jump considerably if people didn’t have to pay the tuition, thereby increasing educational segregation?
Finally, and most importantly, a proposal that would take at least a half-billion dollars out of the public system can’t be healthy for that system. I was reading in the Globe the other day that there are many schools that now have to rely almost exclusively on fund-raisers in order to acquire books for the library. Indeed, Heather Reisman, CEO of Chapters and Indigo, has embarked on a program to fill that gap. What more sacrifices to the quality of public education will have to be made if funding is extended to others?
Mr. Tory has said publicly that this is the right thing to do. My own thought is it probably had its origins in an ill-advised bid to attract votes in large multi-cultural centers such as Toronto. In any event, polls show that it is a very unpopular proposal for the majority of Ontarians.
Election Day, October 10, will see which view prevails.
Currently, about 53000 children attend such privately-funded schools. Tory’s contention that the extension of funding will ‘bring them into the public tent’ and promote understanding and greater tolerance makes no sense to me. First, a public system, by its nature, is open to all, and at least in theory offers equality of opportunity. Faith-based schools cater to an exclusive clientele and refuse to hire those who do not share their beliefs or religious denominations. I doubt that would change were funding extended. One has only to look at the publicly financed Catholic system to see its discriminatory hiring practices which no one challenges them on. The fact is that an applicant must be a good practising Catholic with a note from the parish priest to even get an interview. Indeed, they even refuse to share school buses with them, even though transportation costs could be reduced significantly. Would it be any different with other faiths and denominations?
Secondly, Tory’s assertion that it will bring people together is a non sequitor. When I went to Catholic elementary and high school, I was rarely exposed to people of other faiths. How would the extension of funding result in anything different? Indeed, isn’t it likely that the current 53000 enrollment would jump considerably if people didn’t have to pay the tuition, thereby increasing educational segregation?
Finally, and most importantly, a proposal that would take at least a half-billion dollars out of the public system can’t be healthy for that system. I was reading in the Globe the other day that there are many schools that now have to rely almost exclusively on fund-raisers in order to acquire books for the library. Indeed, Heather Reisman, CEO of Chapters and Indigo, has embarked on a program to fill that gap. What more sacrifices to the quality of public education will have to be made if funding is extended to others?
Mr. Tory has said publicly that this is the right thing to do. My own thought is it probably had its origins in an ill-advised bid to attract votes in large multi-cultural centers such as Toronto. In any event, polls show that it is a very unpopular proposal for the majority of Ontarians.
Election Day, October 10, will see which view prevails.
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