Education Action: Toronto

Public sector professionals, such as elementary teachers, have doubts about the possibility of job action, especially given the difficult economic circumstances. Of particular interest is the reaction of the public to an assertive tone in negotiations. Do these workers, especially those with decent salaries and benefits, have public support? This article attempts to shed some light on some of these questions by starting with a brief recap of recent economics.

It seems to be all around us but I have never quite understood the fascination that senior levels of governments seem to have with ordering junior levels of government to improve achievement largely by ordering them to raise test scores. It seems odd to me when most of the blame should actually be focused on the senior government. The Americans are just the same. They may be our role models for this commanding exercise in school improvement. “No excuses” “any kid can learn” “tough love” BS emanating from south of the border may have affected our provincial politicians.

Deborah Meier is a powerhouse on the progressive end of the American education scene. As the retired principal of Central Park East High School, she made John Dewey progressivism work for Harlem kids in a way that nobody else had been able to do. She and Diane Ravitch have an ongoing debate in the American education magazine of record, Education Week. In a recent piece Meier argued that we already know what constitutes a good education. It is what the rich provide for themselves. This is as true in Canada as it is in the USA.

Bill 177 appears to be a solution looking for a problem. It begs several questions: Is there widespread abuse of power school board trustees throughout the province? Do they not attend meetings? Are school board meetings so much more raucous than the Provincial Legislature that trustees need to be reined in by a provincially mandated code of conduct? Are trustees generally incompetent compared to provincial MPPs? These appear to be the problems for which Bill 177 wishes to be the solution.

Unfortunately, the bill is more ominous than it appears. Here is a slightly edited version of the brief presented to the Standing Committee on Social Policy.

The schools can’t run without us. Every school has at least three or four of us. Some schools may have fifty of us and we outnumber the teachers. When you think of someone who works in a school, the first person that jumps to mind probably isn’t a caretaker, secretary, bus driver or education assistant.

Monty Neill worked at FairTest in Boston for more than 20 years, “striving to change the types and uses of standardized testing in the public schools of the United States.” His paper here deals with testing and evaluation in the U.S., what he calls “another undesirable ‘gift’ from the U.S. to the rest of the world.”

This began as a paper delivered at the Red-SEPA/IDEA conference, Mexico City, February 18-20, 2009, and has subsequently been expanded and developed by the author.

In February 2009 the Toronto District School Board changed its policy to allow increased corporate sponsorship of various school activities. While this might seem to be a relatively minor change in policy, it is in fact a sea-change in relations between schools and commercial interests, with long term implications for the kind of education that will be experienced by kids, teachers and parents.

What follows is the first draft of Education Action: Toronto’s response to the School Community Advisory Panel’s final report on school safety for the Toronto District School Board. The panel was chaired by civil rights lawyer Julian Falconer. Its report is entitled The Road to Health, and was published in January 2008. The report can be found in its complete form at School Safety Panel

We hope you will find the time to criticize this response to Falconer and add your suggestions for improving it. You can reach us at eatoronto@yahoo.com.

This first draft was done quickly in order to bring our concerns into the discussion going on around Falconer’s recommendations. This discussion is still in its earliest stages. We don’t pretend to have the last word on what the most effective response should be. We really need your help to get it right. Indeed, parts of our response are not complete, as you will see, and await further discussion and contributions from people like yourselves.

We hope you will find the time to criticize this response to Falconer and add your suggestions for improving it.

Education Action: Toronto has been a solid supporter of the development of an Africentric school at the Toronto District School Board. Two articles that follow – African-Centred Schools: Not Segregation, but a Path to Survival by Murphy Browne and Making the case for Africentric Education in Toronto by Grace-Edward Galabuzi — provide many of the arguments that have led to our support.

What follows are excerpts from Murphy Browne’s columns in Share
Newspaper – from November 2007 to June 2008 – which deal with the
question of African-centred schools. Murphy Browne is an African Heritage
Instructor, community activist and columnist with Share, writing about the
history, culture and concerns of Africans on the continent and in the
Diaspora. She can be reached at tiakoma@aol.com