The Charter of the French Language is one of the inventions of which Quebec can be proud, because since its adoption in 1977, under the watchful eye of the Lévesque government, Bill 101 has done much useful work. It succeeded in establishing its first objective, the affirmation of the French language as the foundation of the distinct identity of Quebecers. Before the advent of the law, some 80% of new arrivals headed to English schools, but its barriers have cleverly reversed the trend. From now on, children from immigrant backgrounds go to school in French.
But English abhors a vacuum. Loosen a few meshes of the great protective net of our common language, and you will see English rushing in to shine its attractiveness. This is what the latest opus of researcher Frédéric Lacroix demonstrates, whose The duty reported the main points on Monday: in the last 20 years, tens of thousands of children of new Quebecers have obtained a professional studies diploma after training done exclusively in English. And this, completely legally. The trend is growing.
As data from the Ministry of Education reveals, more than a third (35.5%) of all allophone students enrolled in vocational training in 2021 took courses and obtained a diploma in English. In 20 years, this has represented some 140,000 students. The practice is widespread in English-speaking school boards, but the compilation shows that 14 of the 59 French-speaking school service centers also offer this type of training in English. This state of affairs that no one talks about is shocking.
Everything is perfectly legal, even if it contravenes the spirit of Law 101. The Charter and the Public Education Act impose French as the language of instruction in primary and secondary schools, until the age of “maturity”, set at 16 years. Vocational training therefore completely escapes one of the key precepts of Law 101, namely requiring allophone schoolchildren to attend school in French.
The idea of extending Bill 101 to CEGEP has been debated for decades, and free choice is still the political option favored by Quebec. In its recent legislative offensive (Law 96) intended to address the decline of French, the Legault government imposed new restrictions aimed at countering the enthusiasm of French speakers and allophones for college studies in English, without addressing the question of professional training. Tuesday, in the National Assembly, the Coalition Avenir Québec rejected a motion from the Parti Québécois which called for this anomaly to be corrected.
If we make much of these exceptions which end up undermining the French fact, it is because the impact of studies in English on the working language has been clearly demonstrated. When you attended school in English, the probability that professional life will continue in this language is much greater, as studied by the Office québécois de la langue française. Since English abhors a vacuum, let’s plug the gaps that could allow it to gain ground where French should reign supreme.