This is not intended to be a comprehensive treatise on education but
some thoughts on certain aspects of the education system. It is
written within the context of the Ontario education system but it’s
ideas are intended to be universal.

Education should not be political but in reality some of the policies
governing our education system will have to be political decisions,
hopefully based on expert advice.

The
first political education decision I would make is to have one single
education system that teaches Canadian values. I
would go beyond just one
secular publicly funded education system and establish one system
overall, no religious or private schools, nor home schooling at the
elementary and secondary level. Students should not be segregated by
religion or wealth in school and home schooling is often just a means
for parents to teach their own particular version of bigotry or hate
to their children free of a counterbalance of Canadian values from
the school system.

School boards are
perhaps the most obvious political factor in the education system but
what purpose do they serve as education is a province wide system
governed by province wide standards with policies such as curriculum,
class sizes, etc. set provincially and teacher and education worker
salaries and benefits being negotiated on a provincial basis.

The one thing local
school boards seem to get most involved in is school boundaries and
school closure decisions. These are decisions that should be based on
the facts of the situation and not politics and that is how they
usually start out with reports provided by the experts. Then the
community activists/lobbyists get involved, perhaps not a bad thing,
but the result is usually in favour of the best organized who more
often than not are the most affluent communities.

Though some school
board members are indeed concerned with education many run for school
board to gain political experience and campaign experience in order
to run for what they are really interested in, municipal politics.

It is time to leave
education to the experts and leave politics out of it as much as
possible.

The most important
education system decisions are curriculum decisions, which of
necessity at the highest level are going to require political
decisions. These are decisions such as: which courses should be
offered provincially, the decision to stop streaming students into
non-university and university levels courses at grade nine, and the
decision to stop making Latin a compulsory high school course. The
content of courses should be left to the experts, however they should
reflect Canadian values.

Canadian values are the perceived commonly shared ethical and
human values of Canadians.[3]
The majority of Canadians believe they share specific values,[4][5]
with a plurality identifying human
rights, respect
for the law and gender
equality as collective principles.[6][7]
Canadians generally exhibit pride in equality
before the law, fairness, social
justice, freedom, and respect for others;[8]
while often making personal decisions based on self-interests rather
than a collective Canadian
identity.[9]
Tolerance and sensitivity hold significant importance in Canada’s
multicultural society, as does politeness.[9][7]
(Source: Wikipedia)

As far curriculum is
concerned let’s start with teaching religion. The school system
should not teach religion, but because religion is an important
cultural and historical factor in the world schools should teach
about religion, but should do it the same way we were taught about
Greek, Roman and Norse gods, as cultural mythology.

Continuing the
discussion of curriculum, I believe one way to engage students is to
include room in the provincial curriculum for localized units in all
subjects. This will provide students with local information they can
relate to as well as an opportunity to do research using locally
available original sources, like local newspaper archives, as well as
an opportunity for field trips to local historical sites or
distinctive local geographic and natural features.

The first and most
obvious use of this is to learn about the first indigenous
inhabitants of the area their school is located in, but it could also
include the history of early local settlements. There will of course
be localized study opportunities for all subjects, but particularly
the social and natural sciences, as well studying local authors and
writers in literature and other fields should also be included.

Beyond curriculum,
there is a trend to an increased emphasis on testing and exams. I was
lucky enough to start secondary school just after the province ended
departmental exams, which were exams set and marked in Toronto so
every student in Ontario wrote the same exam. There is an argument
being made now to increase reliance on exams partly because AIs
cannot write exams like they can papers. However, increased reliance
on exams can lead to teaching that which can easily be tested by
exams and marked by machines. Exam-based teaching can quickly become
teaching students to pass tests rather than to understand the subject
matter. I always learned more by writing papers than by trying to
memorize facts. I would personally eliminate or make exams \optional
as we did at Laurentian University for a few years in the 1970s.

I have not written
about the hot button issues of sex education, or accepting students
sexual orientation and gender identities because enough has been
written about those issues and, as I wrote, this was not intended to
be a comprehensive treatise on education policy.