Education in Canada: A Country at Risk

Commentary

The continuity of civilization and national prosperity depends on the education of next generations and their preparation as a capable and willing labor force. But many employers find Canadian-born youth lacking the required education, skills, and work ethic. That’s one reason for lagging business investment and corresponding productivity.

Only limited prowess exists beyond STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering, mathematics). In universities it survives mostly among immigrants and their children, and foreign students. A Canadian-born friend doing a degree in engineering at McGill told me she did the writing for group projects “because engineers can’t write.”

Current orthodoxy includes the falsehood that ethnic differences determine outcomes. But it’s bigotry—often racist bigotry—to lower expectations for perceived minorities. Many factors explain why youth of any background may need supplementary help.

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In Ontario, the public school system is fragmented not only by where students live. It subdivides four ways into English and French, and public and Catholic systems. Then there’s further fragmentation, with a tiny gifted program, French immersion, and separate English streams in high school, with and without instruction in French. This diversification requires dumbing down to an ever-lower common denominator, and it leads to an exponential increase in behavioral problems, including assaults on teachers.

A teacher in Winchester, Ontario, lamented to me that she had five students in her Grade 6 class of 25 who had behavioral problems or learning difficulties, or both. She said, in effect, that nobody was really learning anything. It was all she could to do to keep order. How many of her students will maximize their potential?

Educators miss the point that students deeply engaged in their studies seldom make trouble. Trouble starts with lack of discipline and structure in kindergarten and primary school. Admittedly, many parents abdicate their duty to their children. But high expectations at school get good results, including good behavior. Looking at this the other way around, students’ success in school can stabilize a troubled home.

An important benefit of increased intensiveness and high expectations is its impact on teenage depression. Students immersed in their studies aren’t hooked on social media—in effect, a narcotic like crack cocaine that impairs the brain. With good reason, high-tech titans curtail their own children’s use of computer technology.

And one way to promote a healthy mind in a healthy body—seldom implemented outside independent schools—is to start the school day with an exercise class requiring universal attendance. In addition to releasing energy that otherwise might make trouble, it also lessens the challenge of obesity carried forward into adulthood.

It should be obvious that an effective and prospering democracy requires an education system that delivers to next generations the capacity for evaluating choices.