When he presented his new bill last week, Minister Bernard Drainville justified his desire to appoint the directors general of school service centers and to have access to a database by stating that “these measures will promote the academic success” and that “access to data will make it possible to detect the students who are in need in order to come and help them more quickly and efficiently”.
I would like someone to explain to me how the fact that the minister himself appoints the directors general will help the students in the classrooms and promote academic success.
I would also, and above all, like someone to explain to me how the fact that the network has access to data (what data, by the way?) will help to “detect students who are in need in order to help them more quickly and more efficiently.
If I believe what Mr. Drainville said, thanks to this bill, someone in the network will be able to detect my students in difficulty thanks to the data.
So when I observe difficulties in a student, rather than discussing it with the administration, the remedial teacher and my colleagues at school in order to immediately put in place the necessary follow-up, I will enter data into a computer system .
Someone will then be able to quickly and effectively detect the difficulties of certain pupils (which we will have already noted in the system since we ourselves will have already detected them on a daily basis to register them), and this someone will come “to help them more quickly and efficiently”. Allow me to doubt that it will be faster and more efficient. And above all, to doubt that someone will come.
Granting the power to appoint general directions and promoting access to data in education can help the Ministry to have an idea of what can be quantified in the network and can help the Minister to answer questions about all kinds of figures. , but please don’t take us for fools.
Returning to more power in the ministry, the entity furthest from the classroom, from the “field” in the network, is to deny the disparities between regions, backgrounds, children and their needs. Collecting numerical data based on numerical success does not promote academic success. It does not improve student services. It says nothing about learning. It doesn’t help anyone in the schools make better decisions. And it certainly does not help students with learning difficulties or emotional, mental and behavioral distress.
National Institute of Excellence in Education: yes, but…
As for a national institute of excellence in education, at first glance, how can you be against it? A place to reflect, to analyze, gather and disseminate knowledge that is consensus and constantly evolving. Of course !
But there is a “but” with the proposal as it stands.
Existing bodies such as the Higher Council for Education already have the role of publishing opinions supported by research. Many reports have already been published, and shelved by all the ministers I saw passing by, when it didn’t suit them.
In particular the excellent Evaluate to make it really matter, which should have made clear the urgency and the need to change assessment practices in Quebec, based on the most up-to-date research on the subject, the results of which are fairly unanimous all over the world, but also mentioning the perceptions and experiences of teachers, school administrators, parents… Since the publication of this report in 2019, nothing has changed in assessment practices in Quebec. Teachers who want to be up to date do so by using their professional autonomy, in addition to the mandatory evaluation measures in our Quebec system.
The Department also already publishes reference documents to update the suggested practices for certain skills in the program, particularly in reading and writing. THE Writing intervention repository, published in 2017, also remains unknown to most of the teachers I meet. In the introduction to this document, it is written that it “offers interventions recognized as effective by research to support the development of writing skills for all students, particularly those at risk of encountering difficulties, or who encounter them. already, whatever the cause of these difficulties. However, since the publication of this reference system, there has been no ministerial instruction on this subject nor massive continuing education to present these practices and support teachers in their concrete application in the classroom.
And despite all the good things I think about the need to rely on evidence-based practices to provide all students with the ideal conditions to become engaged, motivated and competent learners, how can I be sure that one ideology is not favored rather than others, in the name of science? I can’t help but think of what’s been going on for about five years in the United States, and more recently in the other Canadian provinces. Monumental abuses are occurring. Major setbacks, particularly in the teaching of reading and writing.
A group that claims to be the holder of THE science (they call themselves, moreover, rather pretentiously, I find, Science of Reading) leads certain States to ban practices despite the fact that they are supported by exhaustive research and to day, for the benefit of a single type of practice. Can a national institute claim to have the only truth without its conclusions being open to criticism? How can we ensure the transparency of such an institute?
All this added to the absence of concrete measures to support students and teachers, to counter the shortage of all school personnel, including the attraction of professionals, to promote retention, to resolve the inequity of our system at three speeds, all that seems most urgent at the moment in education, combined with the repatriation of powers to the minister, makes me doubt the merits of the proposal in its current state.