With grave concern I am following the efforts of the Toronto Catholic School Board attempting to eliminate the teaching of “international” languages in our schools on the pretext that there is a legal problem and based on complaints from some parents. I also understand that the matter was the subject of a labor dispute pertaining to teachers and that a decision was reached by an arbitrator to the effect that the teachers in the schools where these languages are taught could not maintain their regimen of an extra half hour of presence at school as their commitment to the languages program.
I would make the following points:
1. The teaching of languages such as German, Hebrew, Italian and Ukrainian is not the teaching of “International” languages, it is the teaching of heritage languages. For example, my children grew up as Ukrainian-Canadian and learned their Ukrainian language in Canada. Their Ukrainian language and culture is a Canadian phenomenon. There is no clash here - They love Canada and Ukraine in the same way they love their father and mother.
2. There is no legal reason why these languages cannot be taught in Catholic schools. Section 28 of Canada’s charter of rights and freedoms guarantees multiculturalism and therefore their right to be included in the curriculum. If other provinces can teach these languages there, we can teach them here.
3. Complaints from some parents, undisclosed in terms of what the reasons are, afford no pretext for eliminating them.
4. To abolish the entire heritage language program on the basis of a labor dispute pertaining to teachers makes about as much sense as the abolition of the criminal justice system because of a dispute in the police officers union.
In recent years multiculturalism has been under an unjustified savage attack in Ontario. Those who would abolish it have no reasonable alternative vision to replace it. Canada and Ontario in particular has always been, is and will always be multicultural. It is only a matter of either recognizing this fact or senselessly fighting it. The funds used to fund heritage languages have been raised from those diverse communities who seek to have their children learn their mother tongue. There is no fairness in forcing them to teach these languages outside the system yet taxing them to teach French or say First Nations languages inside it. We either must learn to support and defend each other’s cultures or in the end we will all perish. We should follow the maxim that you can get anything you want in life so long as you help enough other people get what they want.
You are my Member of Provincial Parliament and education is a provincial responsibility. I therefore implore you to help put an end to this absurd arbitrator's decision and the consequent revision of this province's language policy in the Catholic School system. Your voice matters Christine. Please speak up.
