Leonard Baak, "Separate schools inhibit diversity", National Post, June 28, 2007.
 
Reprinted with the permission of the author.
 
Separate schools inhibit diversity
 
Re: Separate System Allows For Diversity, letter, June 26.
 
While Ontario's separate school boards may allow for some diversity, let's not pretend that they come anywhere close to reflecting the diversity of society as a whole or that they allow it out of the goodness of their hearts.
 
Last year, the Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board revealed that 7% of its student population was non-Catholic. It was a rare revelation, and very revealing. That number represents a pretty poor correlation to the 66% of non-Catholics in the population of Ontario.
 
Moreover, Amelia Elstub's citation in her letter of St. Thomas Aquinas Secondary School in Oakville, Ont., is a bad example. Ontario's publicly funded Catholic high schools must accept students of all faiths. Catholic elementary schools, on the other hand, can discriminate at will. Permanent teaching positions at both levels are essentially closed to non-Catholics.
 
The lack of diversity in separate schools, compared to the population as a whole, is not limited to religious diversity. Census figures reveal that it is impossible to segregate Ontario children by religion and not introduce some degree of racial and ethnic segregation at the same time.
 
If Ontario wants a truly diverse education system that brings students of all backgrounds together in an environment that fosters mutual respect and understanding, it is time for us to move to a single public school system.
 
Leonard Baak
president, Education Equality in Ontario
Ottawa.
 

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