In the wake of the Coalition avenir Québec (CRCAQ) Relève Commission congress, it is crucial to warn against the promotion of a three-tier education system and the simplistic solutions recently relayed by certain media. For the common interest of the Quebec nation, the solution that is needed is to focus all of our efforts and resources on strengthening an accessible and quality public network for all.
The notion of “speed”, as it has been addressed in the context of discussions on the Quebec education system, allows us to describe the three types of educational offers available that compete in our school market: the subsidized private school, the school with selective special programs and ordinary public schools. Thus, people calling for the end of the three-speed school are proposing the end of the school market by eliminating the selection by grades of the public’s special projects and the end of fees in the subsidized private school network.
It is therefore false to claim, as the CRCAQ and the Minister of Education do, that the end of the three-speed school would mean the end of all possibilities for modulating the educational program. Special programs could continue to exist by being offered to the entire population.
This denotes a misunderstanding of the unequal functioning of our education system. This reality was highlighted in 2016 by the Higher Council of Education. Since then, studies have continued to demonstrate the harmful effects of this school system on vulnerable populations and highlight that the system no longer meets the ideal of equality of opportunity that the Quiet Revolution wanted to bequeath to us. The great sociologist Guy Rocher, in The Press in 2020, denounced the fact that this three-speed system caused “human waste”.
Also, although the PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) test included in the 2018 report of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) highlighted that Canada ranked sixth, experts question the realism of the portrait painted by the OECD for Quebec. It is also necessary to put an end to a false belief: including high-performing students in diverse classes would not slow down their development. On the contrary, studies show that school diversity, done under appropriate conditions, allows for the development of collective mutual aid and the overall raising of the class level without penalizing the highest performers.
Rethinking the system
Stopping the selection process for special programs while ending public funding for private schools is justified by a central principle, already at the heart of the Parent Commission’s thinking: equality of opportunity (which can also be called “equity”, according to the oft-shared image of the comparison between the term “equality” and the term “equity”) and universal access to quality education. The half-measures proposed by the CRCAQ and taken up by the Minister of Education (mandatory introduction of the formal “vous”, obligation to wear a uniform) and those listed in certain media (tax credit, salary increases for public school principals) will not reverse the fundamentally unequal and inequitable dynamic that has infiltrated our education system.
An oil change is not enough, we need to change the transmission. The time has come for a Parent 2.0 Commission. Over the past year, the Parti Québécois has committed, if elected, to holding a public consultation aimed at rethinking our education system in order to restore balance and equity to a system in crisis and to return to the spirit of a well-integrated education system, serving the common interest, from primary school to university. The working committee towards a National Education Commission is already at work, laying the foundations for what will allow us to rethink national education and develop a vision capable of generating the enthusiastic support of as many Quebecers as possible.
According to Guy Rocher’s own opinion, the Parent Commission aimed to establish the Quebec education system for the next 25 years. This exercise must be updated as quickly as possible; we have already waited too long.