Finally, we know the curriculum and the goals that, through it, the new Culture and Citizenship of Quebec (CCQ) course will aim for, which will replace the Ethics and Religious Culture (ECR) course at the start of the 2023 academic year. website. Those responsible for its design have, in my opinion, done an excellent job.
CCQ: what it will be about
It will be remembered that the ECR course had, over the years, been the subject of numerous criticisms, to which had more recently been added those born of the inclusion of secularism in the law, which made it more and more problematic, if not impossible, the offer of such a course.
The new course should be given during the six years of elementary school and four years of secondary school — it will not be given during the third year of secondary school.
The primary program aims to prepare students for the exercise of Quebec citizenship; it is concerned with the recognition of oneself and of the other and deals with the pursuit of the common good. Dialogue and critical thinking are gradually integrated from one cycle to the next.
In secondary school, a first skill is “anchored in sociology (understanding of culture, relationships between individuals and groups)”. A second competency is “anchored in ethics (reflecting on the benchmarks on which choices are based, which involve values and standards)”. There will be room for dialogue and critical thinking “transversally linked to the two skills”.
The part dealing with critical thinking, with in particular the study of sophisms, cognitive biases and the practice of healthy discussion, addresses valuable elements and I applaud them. All this has certainly always been essential for the exercise of citizenship, but it is more than ever today, in the age of social networks and the polarizations and confinements in echo bubbles that they engender.
There is still time before the official rollout, and much will be learned about what can be improved through the welcome testing underway and listening to the diverse viewpoints that will be expressed on the program as that it is proposed.
The fine work carried out by David Santarossa and François Côté on behalf of the Institut de recherche sur le Québec (IRQ), which I invite you to read, sees as I do the undeniable merits of the program, but also calls for improvements and warns of possible serious danger.
The IRQ point of view
A first set of criticisms concerns the conception of Quebec culture offered in this course. We remind you that we are moving away, and that’s good, from the more strictly civic vision of Quebec identity proposed by the ECR course and that we will transmit essential knowledge to found and form an identity. But how to think of its construction and in particular the integration of the various affiliations, among other religious, more particularly in these times when various identities claim recognition?
Here, the authors wish for a stronger insistence on an ideal of “cultural convergence”, a concept that appeared during the debates on Bill 101, which they oppose to multiculturalism. The suggested addition of an “s” in the name of the course would go in this direction: Culture and citizenship of Quebec.
Another set of criticisms concerns the idea of secularism and its relation to citizenship.
Essentially, if we welcome the fact that we wanted, when the course was announced, to give this concept and all that it requires in terms of content and teaching methods a central place in the proposed program , this is no longer the case.
We write in particular (p. 20): “Secularism is not part of the concepts prescribed by the program in secondary school, it is only present in the “notions and indicative examples” in two different themes, “Collective life and public space” and “Democracy and social order”. This means that a Quebec student could, in theory, follow the CCQ course throughout his secondary school without addressing the notion of secularism. We suspect that in practice many teachers will approach this subject, the optional nature of the latter is nevertheless disappointing. It is also special that in the presentation of the CCQ program, one of the first elements mentioned concerning Quebec society is that it is “structured by a secular and democratic rule of law”. Why mention secularism as a fundamental aspect of Quebec society while failing to put this concept at the heart of the program? This is a contradiction that must be resolved. »
I agree. Secularism must permeate all the content and activities of this course.
I come to the danger announced above. You have no doubt heard of it: it is that legal actions against the course are initiated, as one might suspect, by religious lobbies. For these protesters, the course would undermine their desire to transmit their beliefs to their children.
According to Guillaume Rousseau, Director of Applied State Law and Policy Programs at the University of Sherbrooke, with whom I spoke, this risk of challenge is moderately high and the request would probably not be rejected at the beginning of the process. . So we would go to trial. The protesters could lose, but we cannot be certain.
There is therefore a legal uncertainty for which we must be prepared.