By refusing to renew funding for the Lab-École project, the Legault government is demonstrating a “total lack of vision,” worried one of the project’s vice-presidents, Pierre Lavoie, on Wednesday.
The Lab schools, “I don’t like it when they’re presented as the most beautiful schools,” he said. “They’re the best schools! My bike is sometimes a lot less beautiful than my neighbor’s, but what I want is for it to be more efficient,” added the co-founder of the Grand défi Pierre Lavoie, speaker and athlete.
Radio-Canada revealed that Quebec did not intend to renew funding for the Lab-École project, launched in 2017. In a press briefing, Education Minister Bernard Drainville then stated that the decision did not come from the government. “It was their decision to stop, it was not our decision. That’s what was planned,” said the elected official.
In an interview at DutyPierre Lavoie argued the opposite. “The funding was stopping. We had already met them [au gouvernement] to say: we should continue, you should continue and continue to have a vehicle for verification and innovation,” he detailed. Was the decision imposed on the board of directors of Lab-École, of which he is a member? “Totally,” he replied.
” [L’éducation]I think that’s really his priority [au premier ministre]. Mr. Legault, I feel he is sincere when he says that. But it is complicated: the machine, the budgets…,” he said. In Mr. Lavoie’s opinion, the decision regarding the Lab-École, “is a total lack of vision.” “We will all regret it,” he warned.
A Vision for New Problems
The Lab-École project, launched by former Liberal minister Sébastien Proulx, was supposed to last five years. It survived the change of government and will end in June 2025. It will therefore have lasted eight years, due in particular to the pandemic.
Mr. Lavoie agrees that the end of the funding was planned. But “what we are told is that the Lab must continue because along the way, there are changes that have occurred. An example: screens. In 2017, it was not really such a serious problem,” he illustrated. With an innovation project, Quebec could see certain problems coming, added the athlete, taking the example of the huge multipurpose schools. “We built mega schools and [aujourd’hui]everyone comes by bus. […] We pay a billion dollars a year for school transportation. Children no longer walk.
The process of innovation and adaptation must never stop, argued Mr. Lavoie. Especially since Quebec’s schools are aging and need to be maintained. “If we stop the Lab, we saw it in your newspaper: the government is dictating [les normes de construction] schools, with materials, bricks… That’s not innovation. We’re going back to the old model, we’re going to do everything the same,” Mr. Lavoie lamented.
In a recent article in the Dutythe Order of Architects of Quebec (OAQ) and the Association of Architects in Private Practice of Quebec (AAPPQ) have expressed their concerns about the “restrictive” criteria imposed by the government when building schools.