TORONTO – The Business world is pretty ruthless: do your assigned job, produce results consistent with the team’s vision or go somewhere else. It is about the money (investment) and service (product).
Believe it or not, in the province of Ontario, the largest government investment is its future is measured in dollars spent on Education – $28 billion projected for academic 2023-2024. By and large, curriculum goals are established by provincial authorities. Those goals are accompanied by financial allocations to secure outcomes. Not to be too crass about it, “recognize and implement this duty and you’ll get the money”.
What some people find unique about Ontario is that about 25% of that amount is spent on achieving those goals through a Catholic lens. There is no discrimination involved or intended. The arrangement was negotiated as a condition for the creation of what we call Canada.
The outcome of the negotiations was a contract – the Constitution – whereby Catholic parents inscribed therein [protected] rights to educate their children in an environment consistent with their values and ethics without interference from the State or of any other religious or areligious group. The Catholic Church, known as the magisterium, is the only recognized authority in that contract authorized to interpret “that lens”.
No director of education, no board of trustees, no teachers’ unions, in fact, no individual teacher can take that protected right away from Catholic parents and their Church. They have no authority to arrive at an independent assessment of what is or is not desirable in that Catholic ethic. Their condition of work in a Catholic environment is the defense and promotion of that Catholic lens. Nothing prevents them from seeking employment or a career elsewhere.
It has served the province relatively well. Notwithstanding the growth of the non-Christian [Catholic] population, stresses for the Catholic citizenry have come from within as attention-seekers and career climbers put their interests ahead of those of parents and their offspring. They appear ready to “tear down” what others have created so that they can “glory it over lesser mortals”.
Several school boards have allowed themselves to become embroiled in issues that challenge parents and the motivations that led them to register their children in a catholic school. The “leadership” in those boards is suffocating parental objections to curry favour with a manifestly wokist anti-Catholic Minister and Ministerial Staff.
In the Toronto Catholic District School Board (TCDSB), perhaps inspired by the infamous wearer of busty prosthetics in Halton Public District School Board, an elementary school teacher is allowed to thumb his nose at the board, its Vision Statement and the Church with impunity.
In a letter to Director Browne (to whom he vests authority to forward to Corriere Canadese) he dictates his own conditions of work by telling the reader what he will and what he will not teach in his classroom as it may relate to sex and sexual practices, even if these may run counter to Catholic teachings and the will of the parents. None of his students are older than thirteen.
Information regarding this teacher has been pouring into the Corriere from teachers, from his community and from parents. The picture is less than pretty. It needs more attention than this column today can afford.
As at writing, neither the teacher, nor the Union, nor the Director, nor Trustees have responded to email or phone messages from the Corriere.
Remember it is not about morality. It is about the money: they have taken the money and not delivered the goods or services. They have not fulfilled their duty to the parent-client. What do they deserve?
