FACE TO FACE: Does court-ordered 'socialization' in Quebec case go too far?
Quebec judge Nicole Bernier tossed a fox into the henhouse recently when she ordered that four home-schooled children be placed in public daycare and public school for "socialization."
Talk about red meat for anti-government types like my Tea Party pal next door. The "government" is sticking its nose into our lives, abusing the rights of a good, hard-working, Christian family. How could this happen in Canada (actually, in Quebec, where we've never been quite sure they share "our values")?
I know how difficult it is to try to protect a child from a difficult home situation. Such interventions are never entered into lightly by school or the courts. Thus, my educator's spidey sense told me that there were clearly details in this case that weren't being shared.
Details in such cases are like needles in a rhetorical haystack. It took me hours to sift through the allusions to Nazism, the "Quebec Gestapo" and our burgeoning police state. "Is this Canada or Russia?" screams the blogosphere. There are appeals from every home schooling group in North America to stop Quebec's broadside attack on home schooling.
This case is not an indictment of home schooling. It is a specific concern raised by one school board about one family and the circumstances of their four home-schooled children.
Judge Bernier ruled that the severe hearing loss of one of the children hadn't been properly addressed; further, she felt the children were inappropriately separate from the world and were being taught using old-fashioned teaching methods. The judge criticized the mother for not registering her home-schooled children with the district, as required.
The complaint was the second of two. The first resulted in a ruling that required the two older children to attend public school, where, according to school officials, they "demonstrated difficulty" in getting along with other students. As a result, the second ruling required the two younger children to attend daycare.
Although given few facts in this media maelstrom, I would bet that given a chance to fully analyze the children's situation, I would be more likely to agree with the judge than with the home-schooling parents.
The nut of it is this: We should protect children from "bad teachers," whether in schools or at home.
Face to Face columnist Jim Nelson is a retired Tri-City teacher and principal who lives in Port Moody. He has contributed a number of columns on education-related issues to The Tri-City News.
