Ford and friends play fast and loose with student safety
In true Trumpian fashion, the Doug Ford government seems to be doing everything it can to obfuscate, misrepresent and obscure its intentions around sexual education in Ontario schools.
Consider what has happened in the last week. Last Wednesday, Education Minister Lisa Thompson said: “... the sex-ed component is going to be reverted back to the manner in which it was prior to the changes that were introduced by the Liberal government.” Garbled as it is, the meaning of that statement is clear. That previous curriculum was developed in 1998 — pre-same-sex marriage, pre-sexting, pre-online predators and pre-cyberbullying.
Predictably, that pronouncement sparked outrage across a broad range of Ontario. Parents, students, educators, academics — all agreed that change would not only be mandating an obsolete curriculum, but would actually place students at physical and emotional risk. Even the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association objected, saying: “By going backward, we are doing students a disservice, leaving them without the tools and knowledge to manage their relationships and personal well-being.”
The public pressure ramped up through the weekend. And on Monday it appeared, at first, as if the government might have listened. In the legislature Monday, Thompson first said not all parts of the updated curriculum would be scrapped.
“We know they need to learn about consent. We know they need to learn about cyber safety, we know they need to learn about gender identity and appreciation.” Later, she repeated that parts of the curriculum would be taught this fall. “What we’ll be looking at is the developing sexual relations. That’s the part in the curriculum that we’ll be taking a look at.”
Finally, she wrapped up a spectacularly inept few days with a statement that said: “We have made no decisions on what the new curriculum will look like. The final decision on the scope of the new curriculum will be based on what we hear from Ontario parents.”
So where does that leave us? Will students returning this fall learn about these and other crucial areas of education and self-awareness? Or will they be taught 20-year-old curriculum that doesn’t resemble their modern world? Or a combination of the two?
Ford himself waded into the mess yesterday, but didn’t bring much clarity. He said the 239-page curriculum will be replaced by the 20-year-old, 42-page version, which doesn’t mention gender, LGBTQ issues, online safety or consent.
No reason kids should need to know about any of those things, right?
But then he added even more confusion by saying that teaches will have some “flexibility” in September. September, as in about six weeks from now. There’s a better solution at hand. Rather than killing the modern curriculum and replacing it with one that is dangerously obsolete, maintain the 2015 updated curriculum until a new one is developed. And make that development and implementation, including adequate consultation, a priority.
Doug Ford is no fool. He knows from his business background that you don’t replace a process or system that you find imperfect with one that is so old it is guaranteed to be dysfunctional. That’s dangerous.
Rather than killing the modern curriculum and replacing it with one that is dangerously obsolete, maintain the 2015 updated curriculum until a new one is developed.