I have been a parent of students for 22 years. No, I did not, like some of our ancestors, have had 18 children, only three, but several years apart. My eldest entered kindergarten in 2001 and this year my youngest entered 5e primary year. So I know well the back-to-school excitement that is occupying us these days.
This did not prevent me from jumping in mid-August when the Minister of Education, Bernard Drainville, faced with the alarming figures regarding the hiring of teachers and positions to be filled in Quebec schools, had this strange sentence to say the least: “The objective is to have an adult” in each class.
An adult ! I hope so ! We are not going to entrust our children to children! Many of them have already spent the summer with Marshmallow, Noisette and Baluchon, motivated, playful teenagers who are perfectly qualified to put on sunscreen, learn nursery rhymes, play in water games and take care of the general safety of small vacationers.
Despite all my respect and admiration for day camp instructors, conjugation, calculating the area of a disk, or the foundation of Ville-Marie are knowledge to be transmitted that require educational tools.
And even if one day Noisette becomes a teacher of 5e year, because his faith in the future and his love of children will not have dried up by then, for the moment, his good will is not enough. He will need a few more years of training and internship to get there.
For all eternity, the start of the school year comes with a string of “who”, “I would like” and “I hope”. Who will be my teacher? I would love to have Madame Lise, or Patrice, or Lucie, or Tewfik. Will my friends be in my class? I hope the new PE teacher is going to be as cool as the old one. It seems that the new headmistress is very small and that the sixth years tower over her. I’ll die if it’s the same English teacher again.
I have heard these phrases hundreds of times. Wishes expressed in the form of nagging questions. Fears that sound like jokes, sometimes like small ends of the world. I remember saying them myself as a child.
Back to school is a meeting with the unknown, but in a setting that we know by heart.
For us, parents, there are also many worries in the first weeks, because it is often these questions that allow us to predict what will happen next. Will my little chatterbox be taken aback by his teacher or will they get along like thieves? I hope there won’t be too many oral presentations, my second is terrified every time. Provided that the orthopedagogue is available more often than last year. If it’s a form of dyscalculia, will anyone be able to detect it and guide us? Will the super daycare educator finish her maternity leave?
A school year is not just 180 days of childcare at public expense, it is decisive in the lives of millions of Quebecers, parents, children, teachers, staff members, etc. It is a micro-society which is organized around a common project: our future.
But this year, there isn’t really space for those questions. The only questions on our minds concern the adult in the classroom. Will it have the energy, the means, the training and the support necessary to give our children the tools for their emancipation? Will he hold up? Because, for several years now, the signs have been alarming. We are short of staff. Everywhere, all the time.
When did we think that there would always be well-meaning people to come and educate our offspring? When did we take for granted that this was a calling so deep that despite increasingly difficult working conditions, there would always be plenty of qualified and dedicated teachers lining up to support the program? ‘public school ?
I’m not even talking about the state of disrepair of certain school buildings. This subject alone deserves another column. No, I’m talking to you about the work of the Ministry of Education, which, in my opinion, is one of the most important in our society. This ministry should have a budget commensurate with its crucial role in the future of our people. Everything else comes from education. This is the crux of the matter. A more educated society is richer, healthier, more ecological, more resilient.
“Education is not an expense, but an investment. » It seems to me that I have heard this sentence hundreds of times, but I have to admit that saying it again and again is no longer enough.
Minister, we are at the point where there is indeed an adult in the class. Well done. But that is not enough. Having an adult in the class does not give you a passing grade. In a rich and developed society like ours, this is a dismal failure. Not just yours, but that of all those who preceded you in this key position. We’re going to have to make you repeat a year. Redouble our efforts, redouble our resources, redouble our ambition so that our school lives up to our collective potential.
I’ve been a parent for 22 years, I said, and this year was the first year where I asked myself, for real, if I should be the one to go teach in one of these orphan classes. I have no qualifications, probably not enough patience, but I’m an adult, if that reassures you.
Above all, I am filled with concern for the future of our children. Unlike politics, whose fate is decided every four years, their future is built every day and forever.
Salomé Corbo is an actress, improviser, author and citizen as best she can.