Posted at 3:00 p.m.
Finally, recognition
After teaching for over 33 years and retiring for a few years already, I can only agree with all of these teacher comments. Only one word comes to mind and that is RECOGNITION. The recognition of children, parents and school administrators for the colossal work accomplished by teachers. This gratitude is the beginning of a journey and of academic success.
Sylvie Boucher
Help otherwise
I am a former primary school teacher and principal, retired for 13 years. By reading these articles, we quickly see that there is a crying need for support for our teachers. I would like to lend a hand to these unqualified teachers or to teachers struggling with too many students in difficulty, or even to new and inexperienced school principals. But this is not what the service centers offer us. They want us to return to full-time positions or daily replacements. I no longer have the energy or the “courage” at 68 to do this type of work, but I believe that with my experience, I could be very useful to the staff of a school. Why not offer to support those who are crying out for help?
Mario Chagnon
ask the kids
Don’t ask teachers if this is okay in their circles. They tend to talk too much about their fate. Ask the children how they feel at school.
Paul Lapostole
Long live the private
I worked over 26 years in a small private college. I have witnessed day after day the commitment of ALL staff members to ensure that this establishment remains a place rich in learning and human development. I considered that the parents’ investment was worth the effort and I have not changed my mind. Achieving such great things with modest means. Long live the private.
Jocelyne Plamondon, Quebec
For a national food plan
Many things are missing in our schools, to learn well, students must have a full stomach. We are the only G7 country that does not feed our students. For a year, I have been trying to find a solution to start a cafeteria at my grandsons’ school. The organization La Cantine pour tous, established in Montreal, seems to me to be one of the avenues to follow. Although under provincial jurisdiction, Prime Minister Trudeau has mandated Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau and Family Minister Karina Gould to work together to develop a national school food plan. To be continued.
Andre Dufresne
Trust the teachers
Yes, but not to tell teachers “what to do and how to do”! Some, even, go so far as to want to choose the teacher for their child, and this, on hearsay, most of the time! After all, they are the ones who know their child best, they tell us! These parents take themselves for specialists in pedagogy! Why not trust teachers like they trust doctors? Four years of study would be of no use in training specialists to teach? Why not try supporting them instead? If they don’t trust them, homeschool them! The law provides for it. Be aware that school principals and teachers do everything in their power to balance classes. Moreover, when the school receives a new student, all the staff members concerned study their file very carefully, including non-teaching professionals, in order to assign them the class where they can best develop. Often, parents show up without having made an appointment and believe that they will be able to leave it to us ipso facto after only a few minutes. This is particularly the case when the pupils arrive from the “private sector”. The parents then throw us in the face that they pay taxes, and ask us to simply go to work! Public school is not a daycare center or a mess…
Suzanne Gagnon, former teacher and former school principal
Public schools first
Reading your article, I think that an easy solution would be for the government to stop subsidizing private schools. If private schools actually charged the cost of a school year and you would see that many would go back to public schools. The latter would then have money to improve programs, organize activities, and so on. Will a government one day have this courage?
Francine Robert, Chambly
Revaluing education
If education has been neglected by governments, it is because the parents themselves have not given it enough importance. Our governments reflect the values of voters. And the most educated or wealthy parents who believe in the value of education send their children to the private sector, particularly to secondary school, instead of campaigning to improve our public schools. It is a Quebec particularity due to the fact that private schools are subsidized here. There are very few private primary and secondary schools elsewhere in Canada, and no more in the United States or in France (countries where I lived for a total of 11 years) – which does not mean that they don’t have their problems too.
Bernard Terreault
Building on what already exists
For several decades, in newspapers and other media, I have read and heard almost exclusively about the shortcomings of our education system, its shortcomings, its shortcomings, its incompetence, etc. From time to time, I would like to read and hear about the successes of private schools in Quebec. Public schools too — those offering relevant and effective specialized programs, and objective evaluations of the success of Canadian and Quebec students abroad. When we compare ourselves to other comparable countries and jurisdictions, are we really as bad, deficient and backward as your comments and those who express a Quebec bashing so virulent? Why always try to make in-depth reforms to change everything, when for the public school, the only change necessary would be to adopt the conclusive methods of functioning of the private and the public with special programs? I would like someone to explain it to me.
Hugues Beauregard