Pierre Fortin and Michèle Stanton-Jean suggest in their opinion piece of August 3 to make school compulsory until the age of 18 (“Compulsory school until 18, as soon as possible!”). They cite the diplomat Raoul Dandurand who, at the beginning of the last century, targeted the need for a solid basic education as a lifeline for Quebec to get there.
To perfect basic education, they therefore propose to extend Quebec schooling to 18 years of age in order to be able to claim victory by reaching the graduation rate… of Ontario. That they chose this statistical benchmark when addressing the Prime Minister, François Legault, is not surprising. After all, Quebec must have to do better than Ontario, it is well known. For them, adding two more years to schooling will allow more people to be able to read, write and count.
I admit that I don’t understand their idea, which ultimately consists of doing more of what we already do without modifying the basic ingredients. Cake not rising? Continue cooking.
While they give examples of places where schooling up to the age of 18 is compulsory, they do not cite places where compulsory schooling up to the age of 16 or less gives excellent results. Let’s name Finland, Japan (15 years!) or even Switzerland, where compulsory schooling ends at 16 years old.
Choosing American states to support their statement is more than surprising on the part of Fortin and Stanton-Jean when we know the poor results of the United States in international tests.
Two much more fundamental aspects must be addressed if we want education to play its full role in Quebec: the flexibility of the curriculum from high school to high school, the three-speed school system and parents’ disinterest in the education of their children as soon as they reach secondary school. It suffices to attend parent assemblies at the beginning of the school year to see this. It is these three aspects in particular that must first be corrected before simply doing more of what we are already doing in the belief that the situation will improve.
What is more, for a politician with the profile of a businessman like Mr. Legault, keeping young people in school longer will cause him to lose a large workforce, enough to deprive the economy of resources the hour of the shortage of workers and what to prevent Quebec from reaching the economic data of Ontario. But Quebecers chose to live on the right of the social scale by electing the CAQ, so let’s not be surprised to read such reflections.
To see in video
2023-08-14 20:08:45
#education #play #full #role #Quebec
