One of the primary concerns raised during the faith-based school funding debate last month was that it would lead to “segregated schools”. Now the Toronto District School Board is once again floating this idea:
Admitting it is failing some students of colour, the Toronto public board could open a black-focused school as early as next fall.
Two community meetings are planned in the next week to discuss the idea of an “African-centred alternative school” from junior kindergarten to Grade 8 that would have more black teachers, black mentors, more focus on students’ heritage and more parent involvement.
So let me try to understand this: providing public funding to existing faith-based schools would be a bad thing because it would encourage segregation, but creating a new school that segregates black children from white children is just fine.
Am I missing something?
If you’re missing anything, it’s only that according to our left-wing education and media establishment, segregation in schools may occur only according to shopworn politically-correct criteria.
There are plenty of reasons why John Tory’s ill-fated faith-based schools proposal didn’t fly, not the least of which was the issue of what compromises faith-based schools would have had to make in order to dip into the public pool. But that doesn’t negate the sheer dishonesty and hypocrisy of Ontario’s left-wing parties against the proposal; it just makes it all the more blatant. Dalton McGuinty claimed to be the champion of public education at a time when his wife works for the Catholic faith-based system, which is affiliated with a Church that McGuinty doesn’t even believe in anyway. And now, no doubt, he will blithely permit race-based segregation in schools according to a politically correct excuse, mere weeks after he extolled the virtues of public schooling as a unifying force. The hypocrisy is disgusting, but it would be funny if it weren’t so pathetic.
Thanks for bringing this to our attention.