Dairn Alexandre (a pseudonym) is a regular BILD guest blogger; for more information about Dairn, and to read his earlier posts, click here. Dairn has taught in Quebec and now works as a teacher in Alberta, where he lives with his wife, two kids, and dog. For specialized editorial input on this week’s Quebec-themed piece, he would like to thank Andréanne Langevin. Dairn’s post also serves by way of introduction and complement to Andréanne’s forthcoming January 26, 2022 “Hors Série” BILD post, in which BILD will make available links to a series of one-hour video digests Andréanne has created of the September/October 2021 hearings at Quebec’s provincial legislative body, l’Assemblée nationale, around Quebec’s proposed Bill 96.
To understand the slow erosion of anglophone, allophone, and francophone rights over time in Quebec, one would only need to focus on the school systems and the laws that regulate and protect language in the province (Tamilia, 2007). The latest statistics show that 80.6% of Quebec’s population predominantly speaks French at home. But this may not have been the case if the Quebec government had not decided to intervene and implement legislation to promote and protect the French language in the province.
During the 1960s, Quebec demographers realized that the largely rural French-speaking population, whose fertility had plummeted to being well below the replacement rate, would be outnumbered by the rapidly expanding immigrant population within the next few generations (Winer, 2007). In 1977, the Parti Quebecois responded to this concern by enacting the Charter of the French Language or Bill 101. How did this piece of legislation impact Quebec? As Ruth Kircher (2014) explains:
Before the passage of Bill 101 in 1977, English was the only language required for social and economic advancement in Montreal, while French had very little utilitarian value in the city. However, Bill 101 reinforced the status of French as the only official language of Quebec. (p. 37)
Kircher (2014) researched how language legislation had impacted Montrealers nearly 30 years after Bill 101, and saw that many young anglophones, francophones, and allophones considered French to be the language that is of most practical use to them in modern Quebec society. For them, speaking French increased their opportunities to find work and was an effective means to getting farther in life within the city.
Although Kircher’s (2014) research underscores the practicality of learning and using the French language to find work in Quebec, a more pressing issue is the language’s usefulness on a more global level. Specifically, how essential is it to speak French in order to find meaningful, long-term employment in other parts of North America or the rest of the world? The participants in Kircher’s (2014) research seemed to understand the importance of knowing English, the global lingua franca, explaining that this language is of pivotal importance in terms of “socioeconomic advancement in the rest of Canada and the United States” (p. 38). Quebecers, and in particular the young adults within the population, find this aspect of learning English attractive since it improves the likelihood of securing a good job somewhere else in the country or the world. But what happens if you deprive the French-speaking, French-educated population of access to learning English at a communicable level, one that is proficient enough to find work outside of Quebec? Given the desire in the young population to possess a good working knowledge of English, the Quebec government should ensure that the language is taught properly in schools.
Back in 2016, I remember sitting down with the mother of one of my grade 3 mathematics students in an anglophone elementary school to discuss her son’s academic struggles in my classroom. He was a francophone student attending English school because he was granted eligibility due to one of his parents having attended school in English. However, attending English school was not easy for this particular student. After breaking down all the concepts he was struggling with, his mother and I discussed some of the strategies that she should be focusing on at home to try and support him with his learning. We then started discussing the situational word problems that all elementary students are expected to successfully complete on the provincially mandated math exam by the end of the school year. After explaining the linguistic complexity of the test and the higher-level comprehension skills required to answer one of these word problems, I finally decided to address the elephant in the room: her son was struggling to understand almost every aspect of the English language.
“Have you considered transferring him to the local French school?” I asked, naively.
“That’s not an option,” she informed me. “He needs to speak English.”
His mother explained that she wanted to keep the eligibility to attend an anglophone school in the family and didn’t want to lose this right in the long run by sending her son to a francophone school. Except that this is not true. It is a common misconception that anglophone parents have, but it is simply not possible in the way that the law is written. As per article 73 of the Charter, eligibility is a birth right. One does not lose eligibility when they do not attend English school. As a result of Bill 101, the francophone community can only enroll their children in an English school if their child is issued a certificate of eligibility, which indicates that at least one of these students’ parents had attended an English school at the primary level in Canada. As a result, many parents do not have the option to send their children to English schools since many francophone parents these days were never educated in an English school.
This is in stark contrast to the options provided to English-educated anglophone community, who may choose to send their children to either English or French schools in the province. And while I understand the intention behind Bill 101 – to preserve the French language and culture in Quebec – denying the French language majority in this province the same rights afforded to the anglophones is strangely unfair and unjust. From what I have seen in my limited experience teaching in Quebec schools over the years, many francophone parents want the option to put their children in publicly funded English schools. But they just are not afforded the right to.
In fact, nearly 90% of the students in my classroom in 2016 self-identified as francophone, with a number of them planning to continue their education in English in high school. But what are the options for French-educated francophones who want their children to be educated in English? While there are classes that focus primarily on developing students’ English language in French schools, the expectations for these students are comparatively low (Fallon & Rublik, 2012). Many of these students struggle to communicate proficiently once they have graduated, which limits their job prospects considerably (Fallon & Rublik, 2012).
Quality second language education appears to be less of an issue for all students attending the English schools I have worked for, where early and intensive French second language education is mandated by the provincial government, enticing the rare eligible francophone families into having their offspring attend these schools. This is precisely the reason the enrollment at my former school is prospering and my student’s mother was so resistant to switch to the French school board; many francophone parents want an enriched second language program for their children but the offering of this type of programming is uneven across the province and is only available in cycle 3.
At ninety minutes of instruction per day in high school, the French classes in English schools aim to prepare students for most of the reading and writing assignments they will encounter in Quebec in the future. How does this compare to the French school boards’ English second language programs? Truthfully, it doesn’t. For one, English high schools are mandated to provide 300 hours of instructional time for students to learn Quebec’s official language, while French high schools are only required to provide 200 hours of English. This discrepancy between school systems will obviously result in better second language proficiency in students attending English schools because more time is dedicated to learning the French language.
Where does that leave francophone parents whose children are educated in French schools and who wish for them to have a good command of both French and English? Should the right to choose the language of instruction be denied to French-educated francophones in Quebec if it helps to preserve Quebec’s culture and dominant language?
While a small group of Quebec’s language majority may be able to attend English schools as a result of Bill 101, there are also francophones and migrant-background parents that are frustrated that their children are unable to attend the school they want. Many are not beneficiaries of an exceptional status granted by a very specific provision included in Bill 101, namely, article 73, and the number of eligible students in the province is dwindling with every year that comes to pass.
Quebec’s political leaders are now looking to update the ideas brought forward in Bill 101 by introducing Bill 96, which will, among other amendments proposed, aim to cap the admission of French-speaking Quebecers in English post-secondary colleges. In response to criticism pertaining to the proposed bill, some of Quebec’s politicians and parents are seeing the need to improve how English is taught in elementary and high schools, which could discourage these students from switching to English post-secondary intuitions later in life (Feith, 2021). And while data is showing that francophone students are increasingly being drawn towards English CEGEPs and universities to perfect their second language, Bill 96 intends to stop that trend by limiting access to higher education in English for French-speakers.
Francophone Quebecers, like all Canadians, should have the opportunity to receive their education in either or both of Canada’s official languages. They need to be released from the segregated linguistic boundaries imposed on them by their provincial government. Because without the opportunity to learn English communicably, francophone Quebecers are not afforded the same opportunity to freely leave the province for a better life that may exist elsewhere. And, in the end, that just isn’t right.
References
Banerjee, S. (2021, October 1). Hearings on Quebec’s proposed overhaul of French Language Law underway at National Assembly | CBC News. CBCnews. Retrieved January 4, 2022, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/language-laws-hearings-bill-1.6196015
Fallon, G., & Rublik, N. (2014). Second-language education policy in Quebec: ESL teachers’ perceptions of the effects of the policy of English as a compulsory subject at the early primary level. TESL Canada Journal, 29(2), 58-73. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?q=EJ981505
Feith, J. (2021, May 14). French in Quebec: Government moves to limit students at English cegeps. montrealgazette. Retrieved January 4, 2022, from https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/bill-96-would-see-a-cap-on-admission-to-english-cegeps
Kircher, R. (2014). Thirty years after Bill 101: A contemporary perspective on attitudes towards English and French in Montreal. The Canadian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 17(1), 20-50. Retrieved from http://eric.ed.gov/?q=EJ1029181
Laframboise, K. (2014, October 13). Young Quebec teachers face feast or famine. The Montreal Gazette. Retrieved from http://www.montrealgazette.com
Talbani, A. (1993). Intercultural education and minorities. McGill Journal of Education, 28(3), 407-419. Retrieved from http://mje.mcgill.ca/index.php/MJE/article/viewArticle/8123
Tamilia, R. D. (1990). English language business issues in a French-speaking environment: The case of Quebec, Annual Eastern Michigan University Conference on Languages and Communication for World Business and the Professions, Ypsilanti, MI, April 5-7, 1990. Retrieved from http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED334819
Winer, L. (2007). No ESL in English schools: Language policy in Quebec and implications for TESL teacher education. TESOL Quarterly, 41(3), 489-508. Retrieved from http://ejournals.ebsco.com
