Ontario's French-language school boards slam English-only literacy study

The associations representing Ontario's French public and Catholic school boards say they're disappointed they were never consulted during a provincewide public inquiry into whether the public education system is failing students with learning disabilities.

The Ontario Human Rights Commission released a damning report Monday that said at least one-third of students graduate school without attaining the level of literacy that the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development deems necessary to function fully in today's economy.

But the report solely focused on English-speaking students.

The Association des conseils scolaires des écoles publiques de l'Ontario (ACÉPO) and Association franco-ontarienne des conseils scolaires catholiques (AFOCSC) now both say they felt excluded from the study.

"It's a long-term investigation that began in 2019, during which they certainly had the opportunity to find out if their findings could also be applied to French-language education," said ACÉPO executive director Isabelle Girard in a French-language interview with Radio-Canada. 

"I find it surprising that things happened this way."

She didn't speculate on why the commission excluded French-language boards, but called it ironic considering the commission's raison d'être is to promote and protect human rights —particularly for minority groups like Franco-Ontarians.

10% of English-speaking students have dyslexia

The commission's study found nearly 10 per cent of English-speaking students have dyslexia.

It also found that 26 per cent of all Grade 3 students and 19 per cent of all Grade 6 students were not meeting the provincial standards for reading in 2018-2019.

Eight English language boards and thirteen English faculties of education took part. The report offered 157 recommendations to Ontario's Ministry of Education.

French-language school boards, however, are only mentioned twice.

In a press release, the two associations claimed the commission violated its own mandate to protect the rights of all Ontario students, regardless of their language of instruction.

"It's a major shortcoming when we talk about equity of access to reading for all students in Ontario and we only survey anglophones and don't take into account the reality of francophones," AFOSC executive director Yves Lévesque told Radio-Canada in French.

'No conclusive data'

Without gathering evidence that focuses on the francophone experience, it will be more difficult to tackle learning disabilities, the two boards said.

"Learning to read ... is very different in a minority environment, surrounded by English speakers. And therefore the challenges are not the same," said Girard.

"Are we doing better? Are we doing worse? Are we going to apply solutions that are beneficial or harmful to what is already in place?" added Lévesque. "We will not know since we have no conclusive data on our situation."

The commission did not respond to Radio-Canada's requests for an explanation about why French-language students were excluded.

Despite the report's slant toward English speakers, Lévesque said French-language school boards will still be able to apply some of the study's recommendations that are common to both linguistic groups.