Educating our children ensures that there will be well-qualified doctors and nurses and engineers and jurists and retailers and entrepreneurs and scientists going forward.
Even people who have boring jobs (because there are boring jobs and someone needs to do them) can have their life enriched by developing a love of literature, art, theatre, cinema, current events, history, architecture - whatever captures their imagination. Because that imagination can get one through the boring bits of life...
Educated people have generally read more and been exposed to more ideas from different sources.
Educated people tend to have developed better critical thinking and analytical skills. And they are inclined to use them.
Educated people tend to have developed some research skills which allow them to fact-check/educate themselves on subjects more efficiently, which can protect them as consumers, problem-solvers, and voters.
Educated people are more likely to vote for progressive humanist governments.
Now, not all educated people are left-leaning. Jordan Peterson, for example, somehow got a PhD. I have not heard him say or seen him write anything particularly clever, but he is very good at presenting his opinions in a way that less educated people seem to embrace.
And there are uneducated people with great skills at reading people and situations. They can spot a liar or a fraud.
But statistics do not apply to the individual. They look at trends. And the trend is for less-educated people to vote for far-right governments. In the US we see the rise of Trump. He loves uneducated people. And for good reason. They are his biggest voter base. Of course, there is another variable in US politics that is less prevalent in Canadian politics: race. That may be changing as anti-immigrant rhetoric rises in this country. But even if we look beyond North America, the same tendency to vote right correlates strongly with lower education in Europe.
Why do Conservative governments continually cut funding to education? Why are teachers constantly told they must do more with less? It seems to be an integral element now in conservative thinking - We can't have these people getting too educated or they won't vote for us. They will be problematic. They will ask questions. They will be more difficult to deceive. They will be less likely to respond to the call when we tell them to be afraid of these other people. If we can't unite them against someone, they won't vote for us.
Because, even though there was a time when Conservatives and Liberals wanted good for all Canadians but had different ideas of the best way to get there, the modern Conservative movement is not about that at all. They want good for their donors and voters. They don't care much what happens to everyone else. And after elections, they may not care that much about the voters, either.
So, we have this strange, new, predatory animal on the political stage. It wants power. It wants to be able to please those who have given a lot of money to get them votes, so that they can get more money and, also, plum Directorships for their top people when they retire from politics. See Baird.
What it is not, is interested in the public good. What we are seeing right now in Ontario is governance by revenge. Doug Ford's Conservatives are punishing Ontarians. And bringing in Draconian right wing measures. Defunding programs for autistic children, moving to privatise health care, cutting environmental and worker protections, and making deep cuts to education.
Thirty-five children per classroom. And why would they do such a thing, the Minister for Education was asked. She explained, essentially, that they wanted to toughen up kids for real life. What about children who need extra help? We'll have the children help each other learn, and parents can hire tutors, was the explanation. The Ontario government under Doug Ford, is out-sourcing and off-loading education. And if parents can't afford tutors? I guess that's just too bad, just like the families with autistic children who will see programs they NEED evaporate.
And what about federally? Andrew Scheer, leader of the CPC, wants to incentivise parents to send their children to private school, or home-school. His own school-age children attend a private religious school. He wants to offer large tax credits and subsidies to parents who choose to put their children in parochial education. I am not sure how he would do that, as education is within the provincial sphere of responsibility. Perhaps with more provinces electing conservative governments they will strike a deal.
Before anyone flames me, there are some very good reasons to home-school. Isolated location. Medical issues. Bullying. But, keeping your kids from learning science, or keeping your kids from associating with anyone different from yourself, are not good reasons. Eventually these children will be adults and they will be released upon the world with all their peculiar notions and biases.
And I have heard many people say they sent their kids to a religious school, not for the religion, but for the smaller class sizes and better teachers. Why do you think they can offer that? Because they get public funding in some provinces as well as tuition paid by parents. They skim the best teachers out of the public system and they can keep class sizes smaller because they are better funded.
What if we didn't fund private or charter schools, except for those specifically related to a need (i.e. schools for the deaf, and other special needs). No, your gifted child is not special needs. A properly-funded public education system is well-capable of addressing gifted student needs. No, your sports-adept child is not special needs. No, your rich child is not special needs.
My husband graduated from a secular private school. We went to a reunion about a decade after he graduated. The place was thick with surgeons, lawyers, and engineers. (At my public high school 10 year reunion, some of the guys were still living in their parents' basements). And the thing is, schools like Upper Canada College, Appleby College, St. John's Ravenscourt, Strathcona-Tweedsmuir, Brentwood College, there is more to it than small classes and good teachers. There are connections. The parents get to know each other. Your classmates' parents have their hands on the strings that need to be tugged to get into certain programs in certain universities. Strings that need to be tugged to get a placement in a firm or a hospital residency program. These schools are in every way the grooming ground for the next generation of the wealthy.
I don't know that much can be done about the two or three dozen elite schools in Canada. Parents pay hefty tuition to have their child educated there. Provincial public support probably varies greatly from province to province. But even if there was no public funding, these schools would exist, because the very wealthy can afford it.
But should the public be financing parents who just want their children educated in a religious framework? Should the public be paying for parents who want their children to grow up in a separate society? A society based on religious beliefs that many Canadians do not share?
The more diverse Canada becomes, the more inappropriate creating educational silos is. If you have never been exposed to people different in appearance or beliefs than oneself, emerging into a society that is rich with diversity must be a culture shock. And I feel we are seeing the way some people react to that sort of culture shock more and more these days. And it is not uniformly positive.
I have no problem with parents who feel the need to send their children to a Saturday School or Sunday School to learn their language, culture and religion. OK, I feel sad for the kids because weekends are precious, and kids need time to play and be kids. But zero problem with kids learning about their ancestral language and culture. That's important. I am trying to learn Gaelic because it was the language of my people. I totally get that it's important. But it cannot preclude learning the things that are commonly held as truths in our world, including evolution and biology. It cannot preclude learning how to interact with people who are not the same as you. The greatest skill I think our educational system can impart on any student is the ability to communicate with and get along with people who are different from them. If that isn't being taught from the get-go, it is really tough to learn later.
Conservatives, with their ideas about "vouchers" and "special schools" seem to really just want to erode best practices and mainstream public education. To make tomorrow's generation of new voters easily manipulated, indoctrinated, and less functional in a multicultural world.
Voters should be viewing this with grave suspicion. It's not irrelevant or inconsequential. Even if you have no children, it impacts you. The entire future of our country and our society depends on having children who have a good solid education in science, math, literature, history, biology, civics, life skills, critical thinking skills, and an ability to experience empathy and communicate with others who are from completely different backgrounds.
Educational policy will be one of a very few key issues in the upcoming Alberta election and in the Federal election later this year. We need to focus on what the leaders are offering.
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