Wednesday, January 30, 2008

I don't get it - With Update

4 pm Update - John Tory finally opens his mouth - McGuinty 'hypocritical' on separate schools:Tory.

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(Original post)

How is it that Faith-Based schools are so unthinkable that an election was lost over it, but Race-Based schools are not a problem?


Kathleen Wynne is not impressed, or so she says:
Education Minister Kathleen Wynne fears that it will spur other cultural and religious groups to lobby for their own separate schools within a public system.

So why are you even allowing it, Dalton???

Only in Ontario.


27 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is that a rhetorical question Joanne?
The answer is obvious:
If the socialists and libs say it is okay than they get the free ride from the media.

Anonymous said...

let's see them keep the door closed on a seperate publically funded school for "beige" (middle-eastern) kids now.

Roy Eappen said...

Why try and address the reasons these children are failing: chaotic family life, often no father in the picture. Let's just allow some activist propaganda to replace the standard texts.
This is just a form of segregation.

Anonymous said...

It's the same old thing, say anything to get elected, then allow the schools once you're back in for four years.

Gayle said...

We have anaboriginal focused school here in Edmonton (it actually has a waiting list now).

Since this initiative aboriginal students have been staying and graduating in greater numbers than before.

I understand your concern, but I have seen the benefits of such a system. Students who may feel maginalized in a school dominated by a different race and culture are more likely to drop out.

There is a fine line between nurture and segregation here though.

Anonymous said...

The goal of this africentric school is to keep kids in school. If dropouts rates go down and more of the children from this community look beyond the street,we all win. - Janice Brighton

Mark said...

"If dropout rates go down..."

So it's a social experiment in which only people of certain race are allowed to participate?

Anonymous said...

A social program for Toronto coming out of the Education budget, which might just hurt the rest of us in Ontario.
How was it that FB schools would take so much out of the budget but this won't. Maybe, just maybe John Tory was right all along.

Anonymous said...

So it's a social experiment in which only people of certain race are allowed to participate?

It's a targeted attempt to address the serious problems that address a specific community.

Further, the school is not "black only". Kids of any race can attend.

Anonymous said...

Ruth, of course John Tory was right all along.
Its too bad that the voters couldnt see what was right in front of them.

Unknown said...

If I lived in Toronto, and had my kids in a private school, faith based or otherwise, I would be talking to a civil lawyer this morning. My new lawyer would be talking to the TDSB lawyers this afternoon about paying my kids tuition.

Anonymous said...

I don't quite understand how the Province will allow a different school to start up when they campaigned against it.
If we wanted a different kind of medical clinic to start, there would be outrage. What goes here.

Unknown said...

My above comment is partly based on callers into CFRB (Bill Carroll)this morning. I heard Jewish, and Muslim parents with kids paying to go to private faith schools expressing extreme anger at the hypocrisy. Ha, Dalton McGuinty, a hypocrite, who knew?

Anonymous said...

I don't quite understand how the Province will allow a different school to start up when they campaigned against it.

They campaigned against setting up a myriad of faith based school systems, similar to the separate school system we have now. Each system would have its own school boards within it, and then schools within each board. You would then select, in your property tax assessment, which local board you support. Note that you can't quickly choose a different board, and often you are not allowed a different board.

The afro-centric school is under the existing system which allows "alternative schools"
within an existing school board. It therefore has the same level of oversight as any other school within that board. Students can transfer in and out much more easily than between public and separate boards for example.

If I recall correctly, there have been alternative jewish schools within the public boards, but parents opted for private jewish schools, not publicly funded, to better control the curriculum and who is allowed in.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
"Is that a rhetorical question Joanne?
The answer is obvious:
If the socialists and libs say it is okay than they get the free ride from the media."

I checked out the most left-wing/ socialist site that I know of in Canada (rabble.ca/babble). So far it is 4:1 AGAINST a black-focused school. So I think that you may of over-simplified there anon.

Anonymous said...

Hey Joanne does this make you, Warren AND Sandy on the same page on this issue.

Check out WK's blog note about it.

At least he's consistant and living by the campaign code...but where IS McGuinty on this? Getting off way too easily I think.

More to the point. Where are the MSM types knocking on his door making the same connections you did ?

Anonymous said...

maybe this is the Liberal end-run around John Tory's idea without actually being John Tory's idea?

What I find interesting is that the province is paying this board to move to smaller schools, yet, boards in Bruce county are struggling to keep small schools open due to underfunding. To be fair in everything-in-public-education-is-equal Ontario, I think that small boards should ask for the same amount as these alternative schools get in the city to keep their already small schools open. Why? Because the benefits touted of the Afro-centric schools are the same, EXCEPT the focus is on this one population. Wouldn't it be great if we could muster up the same energy and passion and put this same energy and focus on standards in all of our schools? If not..then it's not about standards of any kind.

Anonymous said...

John Tory is right Joanne - folks here have already said what he did publicly.

Good on him!

Perhaps John Tory would like to champion the rural-centric schools and help small towns get equal money for preserving their small schools that the TDSB is getting to move to small schools.

Grossly unfair.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Perhaps John Tory would like to champion the rural-centric schools and help small towns get equal money for preserving their small schools that the TDSB is getting to move to small schools.

Yup. That would be smart of him to do.

Ironically, his FB-funding policy might play to his advantage here if he can keep throwing the hypocrisy of it all in Dalton's face. Might gain him some credibility in the leadership issue.

Anonymous said...

Here's the difference between a black-focused school and John Tory's faith based proposal: the black-focused school with be publicly run by the Toronto District School Board; the faith based schools would haved been publicly funded but privately run.

Möbius said...

Ironically, his FB-funding policy might play to his advantage here if he can keep throwing the hypocrisy of it all in Dalton's face. Might gain him some credibility in the leadership issue.

Do you think any of this will be remembered 4 years from now, before the next election?

JT will be long gone by then. Instead of finding a new leader, and generating new ideas, we'll go through the same thing the LPC is doing with Dion, in-fighting, and not a single sound policy as a result.

Anonymous said...

"They campaigned against setting up a myriad of faith based school systems, similar to the separate school system we have now. Each system would have its own school boards within it, and then schools within each board."

This is inaccurate. There were to be no new boards created and in fact, given the tiny number of students attending these schools, the impact would have been very slight overall.

My first thoughts were as you posted, Joanne:

Why is this plan, based on race, not ethnicity, OK but one based on religion - to fund EXISTING schools, is not?

My second thought echoed Wynne's:

Now the East Indians, Koreans, Chinese, Middle Eastern and other races/ethnicities have a legitimate complaint if they don't get 'o-centric' schools.

Welcome to Canada, the land of the marginalization and ghettoization of minorities - because they just can't cut it on their own in the big, bad, Ontario mainstream with all those nasty white people, so the nasty white people are going to help them out of that mainstream.

What's the dropout rate overall, just out of interest? I haven't seen that published.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Here's the difference between a black-focused school and John Tory's faith based proposal: the black-focused school with be publicly run by the Toronto District School Board; the faith based schools would haved been publicly funded but privately run.

Mé, that is correct to a point, but the FB schools would have been under the scrutiny of the public board, so in reality they wouldn't be 'private' any longer, which ironically was a reason that some FB groups were against the whole idea. They didn't want the government telling them what they had to teach.

However, if you read some of the articles in today's update at the end of the post, you'll see that the main difference is that the Race-based school(s) must find the money in the board's budget, which to me is somewhat of a canard.

It's still public funding, coming from the taxpayer, from a board which is always crying poor.

Anonymous said...

dropout rate?

The fairytale spun by the gov't, unions and their parent puppet groups is that the drop-out rate is 30%.

However this was challenged by both opposition parties, and if you search the StatsCan site I do believe they peg the rate to be more like 19%.

Like all else when it comes to education in Ontario spin trumps common sense and voters fell for it in October.

Tory has absolutely nothing at all to lose now defending his plank and continuing to point out the many hypocrisies of Dalton McGuinty.

Me? I'm hoping like hell McGuinty bails on Ontario and challenges Dion for he Liberal leadership sooner rather than later. C'mon Warren help him find Ottawa.

Anonymous said...

Don't think I could stomach looking at the two brothers in Question Period in Ottawa. David is bad enough talking about the environment, and any other topic that he feels he's an expert in.

Anonymous said...

Thursday, January 31, 2008
Ethno-Centric School in Toronto
Madely in the Morning - 8:10am --- Steve Madely is joined by Josh Matlow, Toronto District School Booard Trustee. He opposes the proposal for a black-focused school in Toronto.

http://www.cfra.com/chum_audio/Josh_Matlow_Jan31.mp3

MadMacs of Bytown

OMMAG said...

So McGuinty says he's against opening the race based school!

Wasn't he against raising taxes?
Or was that for Law and Order?
Or was it clean Air?