I confess, dear reader, that a simple error on my part is the reason why you’re not reading a story in this week’s Barrhead Leader about the province threatening to pull funding from Covenant Canadian Reformed School in Neerlandia.
That certainly will have an impact on the community of Neerlandia and the Barrhead region at large if it occurs, so the absence of a story may seem like we were ignoring the issue. We’re not. That’s all on me and a simple error of reading comprehension.
Like you, I had heard on Wednesday that the province had issued a warning to 28 private school authorities who failed to comply with legislation that requires school authorities to allow the creation of Gay-straight Alliances (GSAs) if a group of students request one.
If those school authorities continue refusing to comply with the legislation, Education Minister David Eggen has promised to withdraw taxpayer funding for these 28 school authorities.
I immediately scanned the list to see if the Covenant Canadian Reformed School was among those 28 authorities. In doing so, I totally glossed over the name of the Canadian Reformed School Society of Neerlandia.
If I hadn’t made that simple blunder, I would have had time to investigate exactly what the private school in Neerlandia lacks, in the province’s eyes at least, and how losing provincial funding might affect them.
To clarify: a lot of the media coverage you’re reading right now focuses on the provision in Bill 24 that says schools have to post a notice informing students that they can form a GSA if they want.
But the legislation ALSO says that school authorities need to have a policy and a code of conduct affirming that students and staff cannot be discriminated against under the provisions of the Alberta Human Rights Act or the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
It may be that Covenant Canadian Reformed School lacks a policy affirming those rights or a code of conduct stating that discrimination against LGBTQ students will not be tolerated. Or maybe they do, and the province takes issue with their wording. Point is, I don’t know.
Nonetheless, I do want to make a general comment about funding for private schools. This has been a thorny issue in educational circles for a long time, as Alberta is the only province to give private schools any funding.
Granted, they don’t get as much as public schools, but there’s many in the education sector who believe they shouldn’t get a dime of taxpayer money.
Personally, I’m in that camp. If your religious beliefs are so strong that you can’t attend public school, you can pay extra for the privilege of going to a private school that teaches whatever you want.
But cutting off funding to some independent and private schools because they’re not keen on allowing GSAs might be a step too far.
If parents are committed enough to their religious beliefs to send their kids to private schools, it seems unfair to force rules around GSAs on them. It feels like an infringment of religious beliefs for relatively little gain.
I might change my mind on this, if I hear a persuasive argument to the contrary. But for now, I’m not on Eggen’s side.
