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Post by Max on Mar 25, 2007 21:13:37 GMT -3
Here's an Editorial from the Northern Life.
Ontarians not ready for one school board
Date Published | Mar. 22, 2007
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The Rainbow District School Board is asking the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association to petition the province to create one publicly funded school board.
There are currently four school boards in the Greater Sudbury area: the Rainbow District School Board (English public), the Sudbury Catholic District School Board (English Catholic), the French Catholic board, and the French public board.
From a 2007 perspective, there are many sound arguments for one school board in Ontario. (Outlined below in a letter from former public board trustee Ernie Checkeris.)
However, the best argument in favour of a separate system, is history.
The provision for minority denominational rights was included in the Canadian Constitution in 1867 to protect Roman Catholics, a significant religious minority in Ontario at the time.
Roman Catholics are now the largest religious group in Canada drawing the faith of just under 12.8 million people, or 43 percent of the population. As of 2001, seven out of 10 Canadians identified themselves as either Roman Catholic or Protestant, according to data from Statistics Canada.
Like having a bilingual country and a multicultural sensibility, a four-school system is part of who we are, even if it doesn’t make fiscal sense.
Each of the four boards in Sudbury has distinct mandates that could not be fulfilled by one system. And there is no evidence four school systems cause racial prejudice, or that one board would result in racial harmony.
For the time being the Rainbow Board should drop the subject.
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Post by Max on Mar 25, 2007 22:12:31 GMT -3
Here's my reply.
Going to elementary school is the only activity that is compulsory in Canada, but our education system still has some learning to do. In school learning is dull. There is only one right answer to every question and you better learn that answer by sitting still and listening passively. The conventional classroom setup, with 20 to 32 kids forced to do the same thing at the same time makes individual initative and exploration impossible. The most common words used in school are; No, Wrong, and Don't. The fundamental learning is negative. Learning is an active process and we learn best by doing. A book suffers from feedback capabilities because the book does not know if the reader is learning. Thus, the typical school and college classroom, unhappily, is not a very good place to learn. Frontal teaching, with one instructor standing in front of 20 to 32 students who are sitting is primarily parcelling out mass education. There is one teacher giving out the same information at the same rate to a group of passive students regardless of their individual abilities, cultural background, or learning styles. Early in life we are urged to study hard so that we'll get good grades. At present, there are 20-32 students per teacher in primary school and sometimes 10-20 students at the undergraduate level. We ought to reverse this ratio. If students are properly educated at the start, students ought to be able to take responsibility for more of their own learning at the unversity level, something our kids are unfairly expected to do at the primary stage. This means intensive care and attention in the years of age 4 to 10 because when we teach our children we also teach our children's childen!
Higher education is now a neccessary ticket to middle class life but it is increasing being priced out of reach of average Ontarians and Canadians. We are told to get good grades so that we'll graduate from from high school and get into college. We are told to graduate from college so we'll get a good job. We are told to get a good job so we can buy a house and car. Again and again we are told to do one thing so that we can get something else. However, the real juice of life is living life itself. Today, school boards are spending tax provided $ competing against one another for students, and educational $ are being wrongfully wasted on massive newpaper, TV and radio advertising campaigns. Education is an essential investment whetheras a passport to a core job or as a route to acquiring a salable skill, but to have school boards wasting our money competing against one another so they can obtain more students and get even more of our educational $ down the road is beyond retarded. No professional educationalist could say this money is well spent. Currently there are four school board in Sudbury and each one has a head office with four operating departments. Taxpayers pay four hydro, heating and phone bills, when only one is required. These board offices do not pay property taxes but the ratepayers are still required to pay for policing, firefighting and road maintenance for this buildings. We are also spending over 15,000 $ per year on gas money for trustees even if they do not use the money for gas.
It s sad that over the past hundred years almost every aspect of our business, transportaion, communications, computation and entertainment, has changed almost beyond recognition, while our school sytem remains essentially the same. Schools used be Teacher - Student. Today it's Superintendant, Director of Education, chair, vice chair, several trustees, principle vice principle, Teacher - student. Education is an investment in human capital but these boards are delivering the same product year after year so we do not need so many chains of command.
Long summer vacations were originaly designed to allow students to help their family on the farm with the harvest, but times have changed and so should our school system. Five eight weeklong terms year round should be implemented. As shorter school year in grade 10, then shorter in grade 11, and even shorter year in grade 12 would provide incentive for kids to finish high school. Currently kids go to school from age 5 to 18. (minus pre kiddie school) This is 13 years of schooling with a two month break every summer, which amounts to 26 months off over 13 years. Twenty-six months is equivalent to 3 years of school. Employing a five eight weeklong terms per year would have students graduating by the age of 16 or 17 with, again, shorter years for students in grade 10-12.
Students in Hungary are better at Science than students in Canada. Students in Hong Kong are better at math than students in Canada. It goes on and on. Behind this facts lies the most important element of all, our current school system is a massive failure and our schools need to learn to run at more than one speed. To learn is to change, and the best learning of all involves learning how to learn, then learning how to change, but if we keep doing what we've always done we'll always get what we've always got, high taxes and a failed school system.
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