Montreal | Secondary schools shunned by local students

Only 45% of students who attend Georges-Vanier secondary school, in Villeray, live in this neighborhood. In the Plateau Mont-Royal, the Jeanne-Mance school welcomes only 55% of young people who live nearby. Montreal parents are not only choosing private, they are also ignoring their local school to shop around for a public high school. A “skimming” denounced by two researchers.

At the Montreal School Service Center (CSSDM), we would like to stem the phenomenon of “shopping”.

“What we want is for there to be special programs in all schools to avoid shopping, and this is also a desire of the Ministry of Education,” says Mathieu Desjardins, director of the education service. school organization. We would like to see less “mobility” of students when they enter secondary school.

In this regard, the figures provided by the CSSDM to The Press are eloquent and show that not all neighborhoods are equal.

More than eight out of ten students (85%) who attend Père-Marquette school, in Rosemont, live in this neighborhood. A few kilometers away, young people who live near the Georges-Vanier school are deserting it. Only 45% of the 1,137 students are from the Villeray district. The rest of the young people are either in a particular program, or in a specialized class (educational adaptation, for example) or in a reception class.

Conversely, La Voie secondary school, in Côte-des-Neiges, which is attended by students from 80 different countries, is 97% filled with young people from the neighborhood.

Shopping: a “snowball” effect in certain places

Secondary school open houses are in full swing these days and many families visit more than one school before making their choice. On a Thursday evening at the end of September, Xavier came to visit the Joseph-François-Perrault secondary school, located in the Saint-Michel district.

“The music program interests me. I play the piano and I was looking for a school where I could learn more,” Xavier explained.

However, it is not his first choice. If he is accepted into the arts-oriented public school FACE, in the city center, that’s where he will go.

“I have an older one, it’s not my first shopping,” said her mother, Geneviève Yale.

She believes that some public schools offer programs that are not very varied. The one in his neighborhood, Georges-Vanier, offers sports and science. For music or the arts, “you don’t have the choice of going to the other side of the world,” she illustrates. On a Montreal scale, this often means changing neighborhoods.

Professor in the didactics department of the University of Quebec at Montreal (UQAM), Isabelle Plante notes that secondary school shopping has “a snowball effect”.

A few years ago, as part of a study, she looked at the transition of thousands of students from primary to secondary school. Young people who went to “regular” secondary school, in a selective public program or in the private sector, in Joliette and Saint-Hyacinthe.

“There are many more students with behavioral problems or unruly behavior in regular public settings,” she says. So much so that she was unable to compare the environments, because there were no students “with many behavioral difficulties in selective or private environments”.

Parents should not be made to feel guilty when shopping for a secondary school for their child, says M^me Plant. “I would say to anyone: do what is best for your child and stop feeling guilty for the whole of society,” says Isabelle Plante.

A “too early” selection

Professor at the Faculty of Educational Sciences at the University of Montreal, Pierre Canisius Kamanzi believes that it is the selection of students – both public and private – that we must focus on.

The selection of students at the start of secondary school is too “early”, he says. “It is in this direction that the government should act,” believes Mr. Kamanzi.

“We arrive at secondary school, we are already selected, our destiny is decided,” says the teacher, who specifies that this selection has less effects when it is done in 3^e secondary. “You have to give time,” he adds.

Mr. Kamanzi published a study a few years ago which caused a lot of reaction.

In particular, he demonstrated that among students who attend mainstream secondary school, barely 15% will go to university. This rate is 51% for those who went to selective public and 60% for students who attended private school.

Professor Isabelle Plante says that the private network has created pressure on the public sector. “The public reacted, and now, the regular is the poor relation,” continues the professor, who speaks of “skimming” due to the selection.

“We agree, as a society, to pay for a system that is accessible only to some of the students. It’s not those who deserve it: it’s the money,” says Isabelle Plante.

In an ideal world, says Pierre Canisius Kamanzi, everyone would go to the secondary school in their neighborhood. “We prepare students to live together and that starts at a young age, in the neighborhood,” says Mr. Kamanzi.

It is also about promoting the neighborhood school, a “public institution”. “If it is shunned by the people it was created for, there is food for thought. »

This is also the opinion of the union which represents CSSDM teachers.

“We will have to make all public schools equally attractive to students and meet their needs so that parents’ choice is natural: to go to the local public school. It’s very rich to have a neighborhood school, and we see it at the elementary level,” says Catherine Beauvais-St-Pierre, president of the Alliance of Teachers of Montreal.