CJE Vol. 21, No. 4

Transcription

CJE Vol. 21, No. 4

Greg M. Dickinson &
W. Rod Dolmage
Education, Religion, and the Courts in Ontario
Renée Forgette-Giroux, Marielle Simon et
Micheline Bercier-Larivière
Les pratiques d’évaluation des apprentissages en salle de classe: perceptions des
enseignantes et des enseignants
Philip Nagy
International Comparisons of Student Achievement in Mathematics and Science:
A Canadian Perspective
Roland Louis, France Jutras et Hélène Hensler
Des objectifs aux compétences: implications pour l’évaluation de la formation
initiale des maîtres
Rebecca Priegert Coulter
Gender Equity and Schooling: Linking Research and Policy
Table de matières /
Contents
Articles
Greg M. Dickinson &
W. Rod Dolmage
363
Renée Forgette-Giroux,
Marielle Simon et
384
Les pratiques d’évaluation des apprentissages en
salle de classe: perceptions des enseignantes et
des enseignants
Philip Nagy
396
International Comparisons of Student
Achievement in Mathematics and Science:
Roland Louis,
France Jutras et
Hélène Hensler
414
Des objectifs aux compétences: implications
pour l’évaluation de la formation initiale
des maîtres
433
Gender Equity and Schooling: Linking Research
and Policy
Essais critiques / Review Essays
John Kehoe
453
Racism in Canadian Schools: Untested
Assumptions (Racism in Canadian Schools,
edited by Ibrahim Alladin)
Suzanne de Castell
458
Funny, This Doesn’t Read Like Educational
Theory (“That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Like a
Teacher”: Interrogating Images and Identity in
Popular Culture, by Sandra Weber & Claudia
Mitchell)
Recensions / Book Reviews
Jerrold R. Coombs
463
Beyond Liberation and Excellence:
Reconstructing the Public Discourse on
Education, by David E. Purpel & Svi Shapiro
Roland Ouellet
465
La recherche en éducation comme source de
changement par Jacques Chevrier
Brian Titley
467
Historical Perspectives on Educational Policy in
Canada: Issues, Debates and Case Studies,
edited by Eric W. Ricker & B. Anne Wood
Yvon Bouchard
470
Les cheminements scolaires et l’insertion
professionnelle des étudiants de l’université:
perspectives théoriques et méthodologiques sous
la direction de Claude Trottier, Madeleine
Perron et Miala Diambomba
William Higginson
472
The Fifth Language: Learning a Living in the
Computer Age, by Robert K. Logan
Trevor J. Gambell
474
Private Readings in Public: Schooling the
Literary Imagination, by Dennis J. Sumara
Nathalie Bélanger
476
Eduquer et punir: généalogie du discours
psychologique par Eirick Prairat
Robert M. Stamp
479
Taking Stock: Canadian Studies in the Nineties,
by David Cameron
481
Index du volume 21 /
Index to volume 21
Greg M. Dickinson
university of western ontario
W. Rod Dolmage
university of regina
Several Charter cases have addressed the tension between the linguistic and religious
privileges built into the Constitution Act, 1867 and the egalitarianism and multiculturalism
contained in sections 15 and 27 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Three
of these cases, Zylberberg et al. v. Sudbury Board of Education, Canadian Civil Liberties
Association v. Ontario (Minister of Education), and Adler v. Ontario, involve challenges
to educational regulations or policies resting on traditional assumptions about the religious
nature and purpose of schooling. We show how these cases, along with two more recent
examples, help clarify the meaning of multiculturalism in the post-Charter context and in
particular, whether a consistent, principled approach and a particular theory of ethnic
relations are embraced by the courts in resolving such matters.
Plusieurs cas se fondant sur la Charte canadienne des droits et libertés soulignent la
tension entre les privilèges linguistiques et religieux enchâssés dans la Loi constitutionnelle de 1967 et l’égalitarisme et le multiculturalisme contenus dans les articles 15 et 27
de la Charte canadienne. Dans trois de ces cas, Zylberger et al. v. Sudbury Board of
Education, Canadian Civil Liberties Association v. Ontario (Minister of Education) et
Adler v. Ontario, les règlements ou politiques en matière d’éducation reposant sur des
postulats traditionnels au sujet de la nature et du but religieux de l’enseignement sont
contestés. Les auteurs démontrent comment ces trois cas, ainsi que deux exemples plus
récents, aident à clarifier la signification du multiculturalisme après l’adoption de la
Charte canadienne des droits et libertés; ils se demandent en outre si les tribunaux font
appel à une approche cohérente, reposant sur des principes, et à une théorie particulière
des relations ethniques pour régler ces cas.
In 1979, Young predicted that issues in multiculturalism would pose serious
questions of purpose in Canadian society and consequently require responses
from the school system. His words became all the more prescient with arrival of
the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. By guaranteeing traditional rights
and freedoms within a broad endorsement of multiculturalism, the Charter has
highlighted the Canadian struggle to reconcile often competing old and new
constitutional values — the linguistic and religious privileges characterizing the
two founding nations principle of the British North America Act, 1867 (now the
Constitution Act, 1867), with the modern notions of egalitarianism and multiculturalism contained in sections 15 and 27 of the Charter.
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Several Charter cases, a number involving education, have addressed this
tension.1 Perhaps the best known, at least in Ontario, are: Zylberberg et al. v.
Sudbury Board of Education (1988) (hereafter, Zylberberg); Canadian Civil
Liberties Association v. Ontario (Minister of Education) (1990) (hereafter, Elgin
County); and Adler v. Ontario (Minister of Education) (1994) (hereafter, Adler).
All involved challenges to educational regulations or policies resting on traditional assumptions about the nature and purpose of schooling, especially in the
context of religion. In all three cases, minority groups invoked freedom of
religion and equality rights under the Charter to attack religious or financial
policies practised by the state in its schools. The later case of Bal v. Ontario
(1994) (hereafter, Bal) is an extension of the Adler challenge to the province’s
refusal to provide public funding for independent religious schools. A fifth case
is Islamic Schools Federation of Ontario v. Ottawa Board of Education (1994),
wherein the applicants argue that the school board’s failure to accommodate the
religious holidays of the Islamic faith, while observing Christian holidays in its
schools, violates their religious freedom and equality rights under the Charter.
Although there are common issues among the cases, there is a discernible
transition from Zylberberg to the Adler and Bal cases. Begun initially to remove
Christian biases in opening exercises and instruction, the challenges have become
more concerned with structural issues, namely, the financing of the system.
Moreover, interesting paradoxes have emerged. Although the applicants in Elgin
County succeeded in gaining judicially mandated excision of religious indoctrination from Ontario schools, the Bal and Adler applicants found themselves left out
in the cold by the secularization of the school system put in place by the government after the Elgin County case.
THEORIES OF ETHNIC RELATIONS AND THE MEANING OF CULTURAL PLURALISM
How a state defines the relations among its citizens, especially how it treats its
minorities, typically is premised on whether a persistent and visible ethnic mix
in the body politic is viewed as either a good thing (to be protected and enhanced) or a bad thing (to be discouraged and even eradicated). In its crudest
form, the debate is a contest between, on the one hand, melting down the citizenry into a nation of “Americans” or “Canadians,” people who will largely share
nationally defining characteristics and attributes, and, on the other hand, balkanizing them into officially structured units within the state, each with their own
defining characteristics, attributes, and values. Ethnic relations in modern states,
however, are much more complex than that. The U.S. “melting pot” sprang leaks
long ago, when African-Americans, U.S. First Nations peoples, and HispanicAmericans refused to be homogenized and the fallacy of a melting-pot principle
in a nation with serious, deep-rooted racial and ethnic divisions became increasingly obvious. The failures of balkanization (the attempted political unification
EDUCATION, RELIGION, AND THE COURTS IN ONTARIO
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of ethnically determined enclaves) are all too horribly familiar in the former
Yugoslavia.
The problems associated with ethnic relations are among the most confounding
problems to study. Developing precise definitions of such terms as “culture,”
“ethnicity,” and “race” is problematic, and becoming embroiled in such intricacies would not particularly advance our central purpose in this article. We treat
ethnicity in Canada as membership in non-Aboriginal, non-English, and nonFrench groups. This treatment is based not on any sociological or anthropological
models but rather on the historical-political reality of Canada and its consequent
constitutional anomalies. Moreover, we believe it consistent with what most
Canadians would call ethnicity. Our treatment is also influenced by the fact that
Canada’s policy of multiculturalism was born largely in answer to large-scale
immigration of non-Aboriginal, non-English, and non-French people. We also
adopt a wide definition of culture, which we take to be a collection of values, as
well as the personal and group relationships and institutional arrangements
common across a society or particular sub-groups within a society.
Following Wirth (1945), Young (1979, p. 7) identifies four ways an ethnic
group can deal with living in a state in which it is a minority. First, it can be
assimilated, effectively abandoning its cultural identity; second, it can work for
pluralism, seeking tolerance by the majority for minority values and differences;
third, it can attempt to secede and exist independently; and, fourth, it can adopt
militant tactics — non-violent or otherwise — to wrest power from the majority.
Given the context of a Canadian policy of multicultural promotion and the legal
focus of our analysis, we are concerned primarily with pluralism.
Pluralism presupposes the maintenance of the cultural identity of ethnic groups
through either passive tolerance by or active support of the state. Young (1979)
explains that pluralism is used as both a descriptive and a normative concept.
Descriptively, pluralism may refer to either cultural pluralism or structural
pluralism. A culturally pluralist society is one in which ethnic groups have
languages, religions, kinships, tribal affiliations, and traditional norms and values
setting them apart from one another. Structural pluralism, however, describes a
society in which different cultures are “segmented into ‘analogous, parallel,
non-complementary, but distinguishable sets of institutions’ ” (p. 8). As such,
structural pluralism can be said to be the institutional expression of cultural
pluralism.
Normative pluralism, on the other hand, speaks to the way a society should
conduct its ethnic relations. In particular, it addresses questions concerning what
laws, policies, and institutional arrangements should be effected to determine
access to social rewards, for example, education. Two constructs are used to
explain the two different approaches that may be adopted towards normative
pluralism: liberal pluralism and corporate pluralism.
Liberal pluralism is consistent with a traditional antidiscrimination model of
human rights and ethnic relations. It provides for an absence, indeed legal
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prohibition, of distinctions — whether by law or governmental policy or action —
based on race, religion, national origin, ethnicity, and so on (Young, 1979, p. 8).
Under liberal pluralism, groups have no official standing in legal or governmental affairs because of their ethnicity, thus precluding both prejudicial and
preferential treatment of them by the state. Conversely, in a state embracing
corporate pluralism, ethnic groups are accorded official or even legal standing as
corporate entities. Whereas Young speaks of corporate pluralism as a model promoting the favourable or preferential treatment of ethnic groups — for example,
in the allocation of social-economic benefits, often in a quota system based on
their proportionate representation in society — there seems to be no reason to
exclude from the definition a system of apartheid that identifies ethnic groups
and assigns them official status only to exclude them from social rewards (or
worse). Unfortunately, once a philosophy sanctioning the official recognition of
groups according to their ethnicity is adopted, the only factors distinguishing
corporate pluralism from assimilationist, indeed annihilationist, policies are the
governmentally determined purposes for which the ethnic classification can be
used.
Constitutional guarantees, however, like section 15 of the Canadian Charter
of Rights and Freedoms, may ensure the legitimacy of the former uses of racial,
ethnic, and similar classifications, while outlawing the latter. But the simple irony
ought not be lost: the more a state subscribes to a corporate-pluralist, indeed,
even a liberal-pluralist, model, the more it is driven necessarily to classify its
citizens by race and ethnicity, an activity viewed with great suspicion, if not
outright dread, by civil libertarians. Merely enforcing the antidiscrimination laws
of a liberal-pluralist state requires recognition of race, colour, and ethnicity as
categories under the law. In fact, some members of ethnic minorities cynically
view policies of corporate pluralism as governmental “divide and conquer” ploys
to hyphenate society into African-Canadians, Chinese-Canadians, Japanese-Canadians, Italian-Canadians, and so on, thus preserving a disunited and relatively
impotent body politic. For example, in 1978, Laura Sabia, a Canadian feminist
and journalist of Italian descent, stated:
How come . . . we have all acquired a hyphen? We have allowed ourselves to become
divided along the lines of ethnic origins, under the pretext of the “Great Mosaic.” A
dastardly deed has been perpetrated upon Canadians by politicians whose motto is “divide
and rule.” I, for one, refuse to be hyphenated. I am a Canadian, first and foremost. Don’t
hyphenate me. (cited in Bissoondath, 1994, p. 224)
In many respects, the distinction between liberal and corporate pluralism
mirrors modern equality discourse, which distinguishes between formal equality
(or equality of treatment) and substantive equality (or equality of results) (Sheppard, 1993). Advocates of formal equality aspire to a colour-blind society in
which the state and its laws treat all people the same, regardless of race, colour,
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ethnicity, religion, and so on. Equality of treatment, though retaining popularity
among political conservatives, has been firmly rejected by centrist and left-ofcentre thinkers, in favour of an equality-of-results model designed to redress the
past exclusion of minority groups from power and social rewards, and to ensure
the immediate redistribution of such goods among all groups according to their
numerical representation in society. This form of equality of results or condition
can only be achieved, they believe, by granting official or legal status to groups
based on their ethnicity (or other visible characteristic). The use of racial or
ethnic categories for “good” purposes is protected from claims of reverse discrimination by non-qualifying groups by provisos built into human rights legislation and the Constitution itself (section 15[2] of the Canadian Charter of Rights
and Freedoms being an obvious example). In addition, the antidiscrimination
provisions in both human rights codes and the Charter (section 15[1]) are there
to prevent the state’s use of corporate-pluralist categories for “bad” purposes.
FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE
Although the cases we discuss are all from Ontario, it would be a mistake to
assume that their implications are limited to that jurisdiction. The decisions in
these cases represent judicial interpretations of rights and freedoms guaranteed
in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Charter is the supreme law
in Canada and supersedes all other legislation. If prayer in a public school is
found to be unconstitutional in Ontario, for example, it is probably equally
unconstitutional in all other public school jurisdictions. In fact, the reasoning
used by the Ontario Court of Appeal in striking down religious opening exercises
(Zylberberg) was adopted in its entirety by the British Columbia Supreme Court
in a parallel case (Russow v. British Columbia [Attorney General], 1989). The
fact that other school acts, for example, Saskatchewan’s Education Act (1978)
(section 181), still permit the use of the Lord’s Prayer in opening exercises in
public schools does not constitute evidence that the Ontario decision has no
influence in other provinces; it demonstrates merely that the legislation has yet
to be challenged.
The constitutional foundation for the following jurisprudence is, of course,
section 93 of the Constitution Act, 1867. Although this may be obvious, it is,
nevertheless, important for two reasons. Section 93 formally limits the immediate
jurisdiction of the decisions in these cases. These are Ontario cases and, so far,
their impact has been felt, primarily, in the Ontario context; for this reason it is
probably fair to conclude that their importance has been underestimated in other
jurisdictions. Section 93 also separates the existence, public funding, and religious nature of Roman Catholic Separate Schools in Ontario from the arguments
raised in these cases. Drawing on the Supreme Court decision in Reference Re
Bill 30 (1987), in which the court was asked to rule on the constitutionality of
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the extension of public funding to Catholic secondary schools in Ontario, Justice
Anderson, in his decision in Adler v. Ontario (1992), summed up the distinction:
In my view and conclusion, the funding of Roman Catholic separate schools in Ontario
is a constitutional anomaly, with its roots in a historic political compromise made as an
incident of the Confederation of 1867. As such, I am not prepared to give it any weight
in the disposition of the issues which I must decide. I reach that conclusion aware of what
must be the popular view that the anomaly represents inequality and a want of equity.
This was fully recognized and dealt with by the judges in the Supreme Court of Canada.
(p. 693)
This conclusion was accepted, with additional support from the Supreme Court
decision in Mahé et al v. Her Majesty the Queen in Right of the Province of
Alberta (1990), in the Adler appeal decision in the Ontario Court of Appeal
(1994). Thus, an important element of the foundation upon which these cases rest
is the understanding that the nature, existence, and funding of Catholic schools
in Ontario are not relevant, at least in a legal sense, to the issues determined in
any of the cases summarized below.
Zylberberg
Zylberberg et al. v. Sudbury Board of Education (1988) concerned the provision
for religious exercises in Ontario public schools, as required by section 28(1) of
Regulation 262 (1980) under the Education Act (1980) (now Regulation 298
[1990] under the Education Act [1990]). Section 28(1) required public schools
to begin or end each school day with a reading of the Christian “Lord’s Prayer,”
Scripture readings, and, in some cases, the singing of hymns. The applicants in
this case (parents representing non-Christian and atheistic religious philosophies)
claimed that the requirement of a religious exercise was a violation of section
2(a) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which guarantees freedom
of conscience and religion.
Although the Sudbury Board of Education conceded that section 28(1) was
prima facie an infringement of section 2(a), it maintained that the infringement
was justifiable under section 1 of the Charter because the purpose of the law, to
teach important moral values, justified the violation. Christian religion was used
simply as a vehicle for teaching morality and, therefore, did not constitute
indoctrination. If a violation of section 2(a) did exist, the board argued, such a
denigration of minority rights was insubstantial. In addition, it contended that the
existence of an exemption provision eliminated any element of coercion. To
determine this question the court employed the section 1 test developed by the
Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Oakes (1986) (hereafter, Oakes).
In brief, the Oakes test states that for a violation of Charter rights to be found
to be a reasonable limit, prescribed by law, which can be demonstrably justified
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in a free and democratic society, such a violation must meet certain criteria.
First, it must be logically connected to the accomplishment of some legitimate
and significant government purpose. Second, the degree to which the right or
freedom is infringed upon must be proportional to the importance of the governmental purpose. Third, the law must limit the right or freedom as little as
possible. Finally, it must be demonstrated that the same purpose cannot be
achieved in some other way which would result in less infringement on the right
or freedom.
In Zylberberg, the Ontario Court of Appeal held that section 28(1) of Regulation 262 (1980) under the Education Act (1980) failed the proportionality
element of the Oakes test, in that the denigration of minority rights was not
insubstantial and did not impair “as little as possible” the rights of the minority
students. In addition, they found that the exemption clause did not eliminate
coercion; it stigmatized minority students as nonconformists and, whether intentionally or otherwise, created peer pressure for the minority students to conform
to the religious practices of the majority. Therefore, section 28(1) was held to be
of no force or effect.
In response, Regulation 262 was amended to permit opening or closing exercises which may include a variety of inspirational readings but which must not
promote or emphasize any particular faith.
Elgin County
In many ways, the Elgin County (Canadian Civil Liberties Association v. Ontario
[Minister of Education], 1990) case was a logical extension of Zylberberg.
Whereas in Zylberberg the applicants sought to remove religious exercises from
Ontario public schools, the applicants in the Elgin County case sought the
complete removal of religious education.
Specifically, they claimed that section 28(4) of Regulation 262, which mandated that two periods of one-half hour each per week must be devoted to
religious education in each Ontario public school, violated section 2(a) of the
Charter because it coerced minority children into participating in religious
education classes intended for members of the majority religion — Christianity —
even though, as in Zylberberg, there was provision for exempting pupils in
section 28(10–13), and teachers in section 28(14). The respondent school board
argued that religion was used simply as a vehicle for teaching moral lessons and
that the beliefs of other religions besides Christianity were part of the religious
education curriculum; therefore, the practice did not constitute indoctrination.
Any violation of religious rights was trivial and, given the importance of moral
education, a reasonable limit on this freedom.
The Ontario Court of Appeal found that the purpose of section 28(4) was
indoctrination and, as such, it constituted a clear violation of section 2(a) of the
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Charter. Indeed, in obiter dicta, the court held that even if the law had been
found to be non-indoctrinational in purpose, it would still have failed because it
was, nevertheless, indoctrinational in effect. As in Zylberberg, the court held that
section 28(4) of Regulation 262 failed both the rational connection and proportionality elements of the Oakes test, and therefore could not be considered a
reasonable limit on the applicants’ section 2(a) rights. Consequently, the court
ordered that the Elgin County board cease requiring or permitting the religious
education curriculum to be offered in its schools.
The Ministry of Education responded through Memorandum 112/1991 (Ontario
Ministry of Education, 1991), ordering public schools to cease all indoctrinational
religion classes and other activities promoting a particular religious faith. Indeed,
Memorandum 112/1991 quoted the Elgin County decision’s definition of the
difference between “education about religion” and “religious education.” Later
amendments to sections 28 and 29 of Regulation 298 (the successor to 262)
permitted school boards to offer courses about religion and world religions, but
specifically forbade any form of indoctrination in any one religion. In short,
public schools were to be secular.
Adler 2
The applicants in Adler v. Ontario (Minister of Education) (1994) also claimed
a violation of their rights to freedom of conscience and religion as guaranteed in
section 2(a) of the Charter. In this case, however, the applicants maintained that
the violation was created by the Ontario government’s failure to provide public
funding for private religious schools in the province. Further, the applicants
claimed that because parents who wished to send their children to the public
schools or to the Roman Catholic separate schools received a substantial benefit
by not having to pay tuition, there was also a violation of the applicants’ section
15(1) rights to equal benefit of the law, since they were required personally to
finance their children’s education. For reasons of conscience, they argued, they
could not send their children to public or separate schools which taught, at least
implicitly, beliefs or moral values incompatible with those taught in the home.
At the same time, compulsory attendance required the parents to send their
children to school. The requirements of their consciences, coupled with the
requirement that their children attend school, created a situation in which they
were disadvantaged by their religious beliefs.
The Ontario Court of Appeal found that these parents were free to send their
children to public secular schools; however, they were not required to do so. In
fact, Ontario’s compulsory attendance provisions allow a child to be excused
from attendance, providing the child is receiving “satisfactory instruction at home
or elsewhere” (Education Act, 1990, section 21[2][a]). The court found that the
applicants’ decision to send their children to private schools was the result of
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their convictions, not the result of government action. Indeed, the court found
that what was being complained of was state “inaction” (i.e., not funding private
religious schools) rather than state “action,” and that state “inaction” cannot be
subject to a Charter challenge. The court held that the government’s failure to
fund private religious schools did not interfere with freedom of religion because
it did not prevent the parents from acting according to the dictates of their
consciences.
The court also found that the Ontario government’s policy was to refuse to
fund all private schools, religious or otherwise. Therefore, the distinction that
resulted in differential treatment in this case was based on “private” versus
“public” schools, and not on religion. This distinction did not constitute a
prohibited ground for discrimination under section 15 of the Charter. Thus, the
Court of Appeal determined that the government is not required to fund private
schools, including private religious schools.
It would be a different matter if the government chose to fund private schools.
However, whether or not to fund private schools (religious or otherwise) is first
a political question, then, perhaps, a legal one. As Chief Justice Dubin stated in
the Adler decision:
It is not necessary in this case to determine whether it would be open to the government,
in the absence of specific constitutional authority (such as s. 93 of the Constitution Act,
1867), to provide public funding for all private, religious-based independent schools. This
will be dealt with by the courts in the event that such a situation arises and is challenged.
(Adler v. Ontario [Minister of Education], 1994, p. 18)
Bal
The issues in Bal v. Ontario (1994) evolved directly from the decisions in the
previous three cases. The applicants in Bal were parents representing Sikh,
Hindu, Christian Reformed, Muslim, and Mennonite communities in Ontario.
They were parents who, prior to these decisions, had their children enrolled in
religious schools within the public school system in Ontario, or parents who,
although they had not done so in the past, would have liked to enroll their
children in a religious school within the public school system.
The applicants claimed that the judicial decisions in the original trilogy of
cases described above, which resulted in Ministry of Education and Training
Memorandum 112/1991, and the subsequent amendments to Regulation 298
under the Education Act (1990), removed boards’ discretion to provide for
alternative minority religious schools if they wished to do so. The applicants
claimed that removal of this discretion restricted their freedom of religion and
conscience as guaranteed under section 2(a) of the Charter and their freedom of
expression as guaranteed by section 2(b).
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The applicants’ counsel attempted to distinguish this case from those preceding
it. He argued that the fact that the applicants sought only that public school
boards be permitted, rather than required, to support religious-based education
distinguished this case from Adler. He also stated that the Zylberberg and Elgin
County decisions removed majority dominance only and were not intended to
limit minority opportunity. Nevertheless, arguments similar to those considered
in the previous cases were advanced.
The applicants contended, for example, that Ontario’s attendance requirements
compelled dissenting parents to pay tuition for private education, resulting in
their being treated differently from public school supporters, to their detriment,
on the basis of religion, a prohibited ground under section 15 of the Charter.
They argued that the public schools, to which they would be compelled to send
their children if there were no options available, were not really non-denominational; that, in fact, these schools actually promoted a particular religious
perspective — secular humanism — incompatible with the beliefs and values being
taught in the home.
The respondents’ counsel, on the other hand, maintained that the answer to the
question presented in this case could be stated only in one of three ways: (1) The
Government must permit publicly funded denominational schools; (2) The
Government may permit publicly funded denominational schools if it wishes to
do so; or (3) The Government cannot permit publicly funded denominational
schools.
Option 1, it was argued, was disposed of by the Adler decision, which held
that the Ontario government is not bound, beyond its constitutional obligations
to Roman Catholic Separate schools, to provide support for denominational
education. Further, option 3 was disposed of by the Zylberberg and Elgin County
decisions, which determined that Ontario public schools must be non-denominational. Finally, counsel argued, if option 2 was correct, then the government of
Ontario has chosen not to fund denominational schools in either the private
sector or the public school system. This, they contended, was a political rather
than a legal decision and, therefore, not justiciable.
The respondents’ counsel also pointed out that permitting independent religious schools within a public school system could create a situation in which
parents would find themselves in a community in which the only school, or the
nearest school, was denominational. If this were to occur, they would find
themselves back in the same situation that the Zylberberg and Elgin County
decisions attempted to eliminate. Minority students would be stigmatized as
nonconformist and could not escape peer pressure to conform to the religious
practices of the school’s religious majority. That this is not permissible had
already been determined.
Adopting the Adler line of reasoning, Justice Winkler found that although the
state cannot deny or limit the citizen’s exercise of religious freedom, it is not
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required to support the exercise of that freedom through public funding for
religious schools either inside or outside the public school system.
The court also found that Ontario’s public schools are secular (i.e., religiously
neutral) and not humanist. Thus, attendance at a public school would not create
coercive pressures for students to adopt religious views incompatible with those
of the home. Memorandum 112/1991 and the amendments to Regulation 298,
which banned denominational and indoctrinational education, did not constitute
state action restricting religious rights; on the contrary, these changes removed
religious distinctions rather than creating them. Like all others, these parents
were free to send their children to the secular public schools; they chose not to,
thereby incurring the expense of private schooling.
In the end, the court determined that it was not possible to distinguish this
case by arguing that it did not really concern itself with funding — funding was
obviously central to the question of the government’s obligation. Funding
minority religious schools within the public system could not be distinguished
from funding private religious schools. The decision in Adler found that the
government is not required to do this. Like the Court of Appeal in Adler, the Bal
court held that in Ontario the government is not required to fund denominational
schools (except, of course, Roman Catholic schools) within the public system.
It would be a different matter if the government chose to do so. However, that
decision is political first, and perhaps legal, second. Finally, the court found that
the applicants’ freedom of expression had not been violated because they were
denied the opportunity to promote their religious beliefs within the public
schools. The court held that parents, teachers, and students could hold and
express whatever religious views they wished; however, they could not use the
public schools to promote these beliefs.3
Islamic Schools Federation of Ontario v. Ottawa Board of Education
The latest in the ensemble of cases dealing with religious relations in Ontario
education is one in which the Islamic Schools Federation of Ontario and a
student of the Islamic faith, Abdul-Kareem Abdul-Aziz, are challenging the
Ottawa Board of Education’s refusal to recognize Islamic holidays in some of its
schools and, in the alternative, the Ontario school system’s traditional recognition
of Christian holy days in the establishment of school holidays. In a Notice of
Constitutional Question dated 18 November 1994, the applicants stated their
intention to question the constitutionality of paragraphs 4, 7, and 8 of subsection
2(4) of the School Year and School Holidays Regulation (Regulation 304, R.R.O.
1990), which effectively adopts Christmas Day, Good Friday, and Easter Monday
as school holidays.
The applicants had requested the Ottawa board “to consider and make reasonable accommodation of one or more religious holidays of the applicants in the
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school or schools within the respondent’s jurisdiction where the number of
students of the Islamic faith justify such accommodation” (Notice of Constitutional Question, 1994, p. 1). The board’s refusal to accede to this request,
although it nevertheless “recognizes and observes” Christian religious holidays,
the applicants claim, amounts to a denial of their freedom of religion and equality rights under sections 2(a) and 15, respectively, of the Charter. The applicants
seek4 the following remedies:
(i)
an appropriate and just remedy under Section 24(1) of the . . . Charter . . . for a
breach of their freedom of conscience and religion and their equality rights guaranteed under Sections 2(a) and 15, respectively, of the Charter;
(ii) a declaration that the respondent has a duty, pursuant to the law of Ontario, including the Education Act . . . and the Human Rights Code . . . to consider and make
reasonable accommodation of one or more religious holidays of the applicants . . .
where the number of students of the Islamic faith justify such accommodation;
or alternatively,
(iii) a declaration that paragraphs 4, 7 and 8 of subsection 2(4) of The School Year and
School Holidays Regulation . . . are invalid, being inconsistent with Sections 2(a)
and 15 of the Charter. (Application in Islamic Schools Federation of Ontario v.
Ottawa Board of Education, 1994, p. 3)
It seems clear that the catalyst for this constitutional challenge was the decision of the Ottawa board, along with other boards (including most of Metro
Toronto’s) to delay the start of the 1994–1995 school year by two days to
accommodate Rosh Hashanah, a Jewish religious holiday (Daly, 1994; Sarick,
1994). A relevant question then becomes, of what legal significance was the
boards’ accommodation of the Jewish holiday? The boards’ ostensible reasons
for delaying the school year were secular — to avoid wide-scale absenteeism on
critical orientation days and the cost of hiring supply teachers to replace absent
Jewish teachers, who, subsequent to the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision in
a recent Quebec case (Syndicat de l’Enseignement de Champlaine v. Commission
Scolaire Régionale de Chambly, 1994), had a clear legal right to leave with pay.
The fundamental question the court will have to address in this case is
whether freedom of religion is, in fact, being violated. The situation does not, at
first, seem analogous to Zylberberg. Neither the Jewish accommodation nor the
Christian holiday schedule appears to work any coercion or stigmatization on
other religious group members, of the sort found by the court in Zylberberg.
They are not singled out or identified, and hence indirectly coerced, through any
need to claim an exemption from a religious activity. In the present context, this
situation would arise only should they attend school on the Christian or Jewish
holidays and, of course, that would not be possible as the schools are closed. It
is not until the students choose to absent themselves for their own holy days that
they are identified as different from the group whose holidays are officially
recognized by the state. Being forced to choose between missing school and
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observing the most important of the holy days of one’s religion is arguably a
state-imposed disincentive to the free practice of one’s religion. Moreover, it is
not unreasonable to suggest that granting official recognition to the holidays of
certain religions and not to others is tantamount to the state’s establishing an
order of importance of religious groups.
These arguments, or variations of them, are familiar. In Adler, the applicants
claimed that the government’s failure to fund private schools interfered with their
freedom of religion because it financially penalized them — effectively forcing
them to choose between free public education and the tuition costs associated
with sending their children to schools which reflected their religious views. The
Court of Appeal was unimpressed by the argument, as was the Supreme Court
of Canada when it considered an analogous issue in Robertson and Rosetanni v.
The Queen (1963), and later in R. v. Edwards Books (1986), in which the court
held that the religious effect of mandatory Sunday closing legislation on Saturday-observing retailers was too indirect to be deemed an impermissible intrusion
on religious freedom.
However, an important point distinguishes the Adler and Ottawa cases. In
Adler, the court went to lengths to emphasize the secularism, or religious neutrality, of the public school system. If, in the Adler and Bal cases, the courts had
been faced with the fact that the government had chosen to fund some private
religious schools or to permit some religious schools to operate within the public
system, in our opinion, all bets on the outcome would be off. The essential
question is whether the degree of religious neutrality required by Zylberberg,
Elgin County, Adler, and Bal can be satisfied in a system that grants school
holidays for some religions but not others.
As for the Ottawa applicants’ equality rights claim, it is difficult to see how
the Regulation and the board’s accommodation of Rosh Hashanah (even though
not formally part of this litigation) could not be construed as discrimination
within the definition established in Andrews v. Law Society of British Columbia
(1989). Differential treatment of Christian (and Jewish) and Islamic students is
undeniable; there is no question that the ground of distinction is a prohibited one
under the Charter. And, it is quite simple to see how it can be argued that the
distinction imposes a burden on (or denies an opportunity or benefit to) students
who miss school to observe their religious holidays. On closer consideration,
however, the alleged differential treatment of Islamic versus Jewish students may
not be so clear-cut. The difference between the Jewish and secular calendars
means that Rosh Hashanah will coincide with the first two days of school only
every 20 to 30 years; in contrast, Moslem holy days do not fall on the first two
days of the school year. Moreover, as already noted, public schools remain open
on all other Jewish holidays, including Yom Kippur.5 Much stronger evidence of
differential treatment exists in the case of Christian holidays.
It is conceivable, then, that this case, like those preceding it, will depend on
a section 1 Charter analysis for its resolution. Presumably the government’s
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position is that the holiday regime in Regulation 304, despite its religious
referents and antecedents, has a secular rather than religious purpose. It simply
sets out a schedule that has become traditional and consistent with the general
social calendar of the province. Closing down the schools for holidays has many
purposes that have nothing to do with governmental celebration or approval of
the religions whose holy days happen to coincide with the school holidays.
Although perhaps originally religiously conceived, school holidays have become
simply convenient social benchmarks consistent with the expectations of Canadian society. However, the Supreme Court of Canada clearly rejected the “shifting
purpose doctrine” in R. v. Big M Drug Mart Ltd. (1985). Hence, any contention
that the Regulation should be viewed as having a secular, rather than a religious,
purpose because of altered social circumstances between the time it was proclaimed and now, is destined to fail. If, after examining evidence relevant to the
government’s intention in proclaiming the Regulation, the court concludes that
its original purpose was religious, then the purpose remains religious, notwithstanding that it may be viewed differently today by the government and the
majority of citizens.
In considering the issue of legislative intention, it is important to bear in mind
the distinction between origin and purpose — a distinction discussed by Chief
Justice Dickson of the Supreme Court in the course of his finding, in R. v.
Edwards Books (1986), that Ontario’s Retail Business Holidays Act had a
secular, rather than religious, purpose. The Chief Justice stated:
It is beyond doubt that days such as Sundays, Christmas and Easter were celebrated as
holidays in Canada historically for religious reasons. The celebration of these holidays has
continued to the present partly because of continuing, though diminished, religious
observances of the largest denominations of the Christian faith, partly because of statutory
enforcement under, inter alia, the now unconstitutional Lord’s Day Act, and partly
because of the combined effect of social inertia and the perceived need for people to have
days away from work or school in common with family, friends and other members of
the community. These, in my view, are the social facts which explain the selection by
individuals, businesses, school boards, and others of particular days as holidays.
It is important to keep in mind, however, that the Court is not called upon to characterize the historical origins, or even the continuing cause for the selection by individual
members of the community of particular holidays. To do so would be to characterize
social facts rather than characterizing the impugned law. The question in the present cases
therefore cannot be reduced to a mathematical exercise of computing the number of
holidays prescribed by the Act which have a religious origin. Our society is collectively
powerless to repudiate its history, including the Christian heritage of the majority. (R. v.
Edwards Books, 1986, pp. 742–743)
The Chief Justice also observed that the mere fact that legislation distinctly
deals with days having particular religious significance does not necessitate
characterizing the legislation as religious in nature.
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The essence of the religious purpose issue in the Ottawa case is precisely as
stated by Chief Justice Dickson in R. v. Edwards Books: “whether [the Regulation] was a carefully drafted colourable scheme to promote or prefer religious
observance by historically dominant religious groups” (p. 744). In R. v. Edwards
Books, the court found it noteworthy that the impugned legislation included
clearly secular days as holidays, namely, Victoria Day, Canada Day, and Labour
Day, and it was not prepared to view their inclusion as a governmental ruse to
disguise a religious purpose. By analogy, Regulation 304 contains more holidays
of a secular nature than ones of an imputedly religious nature. Absent some
startling and unexpected evidence of religious purpose in the creation of Regulation 304, the real issue would seem to be whether the Regulation has an
impermissible religious effect.
If a violation of religious freedom is found, the case will likely be determined
according to the proportionality component of the section 1 (Oakes) test. In
particular, the court will have to determine whether there is any other way of
meeting the government’s legislative objective that is less intrusive on minority
rights. Assuming the government articulates the need for school holidays to
coincide with the religious celebrations and holy days so widely observed that
massive absenteeism could be expected, then the question of what group is to be
accommodated becomes a numbers game. Indeed, the Ottawa applicants are
seeking accommodation only “where numbers warrant.” However, it is anybody’s
guess where the line should be drawn: at what number, and at what unit of the
system — the province, the board, or the school. Reduced to these questions, the
overall issue is potentially a logistical nightmare. Presumably anticipating
increased claims by its employees for paid leaves for religious holidays, in the
wake of the Supreme Court decision in Syndicat de l’Enseignment de Champlaine v. Commission Scolaire Régionale de Chambly (1994), the Government
of Ontario created a list of bona fide religious holidays for which leave might
have to be given during 1994 (Sarick, 1994). It is worth noting that more than
50 of these days occurred within the school year.
What options are open to the court in solving this problem? First, it could
uphold the status quo, falling back on the Adler/Bal line of reasoning that the
public school system is essentially secular and concluding that the coincidence
of Christian holy days and school holidays is merely the remnant of religious
origins and today nothing more than a matter of social convenience. Hence, there
is no religious purpose to the Regulation, and its religious effect, if any, is trivial.
Such a ruling would preserve Regulation 304 and surely please parliamentary
sovereigntists, but it would fail to answer the question of whether school boards
remain free to proclaim school holidays coinciding with the holy days of particular religions, and, if so, on what criteria. It is difficult to believe that such
practices would not provoke a string of challenges by disgruntled and unaccommodated minority religious groups.
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The other plain option is for the court to find in the Regulation a religious
purpose or a serious enough religious impact to warrant declaring its offending
parts invalid under section 52 of the Constitution Act, 1982. Thus, Christmas
Day, Good Friday, and Easter Monday would cease to be stated per se as school
holidays. This result would arguably complete the secularization of the public
school system and leave in place a school calendar in which religious holidays
did not form the basis for school holidays. Any overlapping of school holidays
and religious days would be incidental. Such an equal-treatment model — equal
through the recognition of no religious holidays — is, at most, liberal-pluralist in
nature. The official recognition of minority religious groups countenanced by
corporate pluralism is nowhere to be seen. The removal of the state’s hand from
the active preservation and fostering of minority cultures would seem to fly in
the face of the rhetoric of the Canadian policy of official multiculturalism.
CONCLUSION
In a speech to Parliament during his February 1995 visit to Ottawa, U.S. President Bill Clinton delighted the federalist camp in the Quebec secession debate
by proclaiming Canada’s inter-ethnic relations a model of success worthy of
emulation by the rest of the world. Putting aside how deserved the compliment
was, there is no doubt that for the last quarter-century Canada has sought a
national identity by cloaking itself in a policy of official multiculturalism. Yet
it is a policy that has not sat easily on the shoulders of a nation founded on
principles more consonant with official or corporate dualism. Indeed, a policy of
religious and linguistic dualism, and a policy supporting the principles of multiculturalism both may be, in the Canadian context, laudable objectives. Unfortunately, they are also mutually exclusive; inevitably, the more we have of the one,
the less we have of the other.
Ontario’s education system reflects an uneasy relationship between the corporate dualism (linguistic and religious) of the Constitution Act, 1867 and the
cultural pluralism of federal and provincial policies of official multiculturalism.
There are plenty of examples of a liberal-pluralist, and even a corporate-pluralist,
agenda in Ontario education, especially in proliferous Ministry policies on
antiracism and ethnocultural equity. Moreover, policies on curriculum and
opening exercises are consistent with the language of cultural pluralism, as they
aspire to non-discrimination, sensitivity, inclusiveness, appreciation, and ethnic
pride.
A degree of corporate pluralism exists in the Ontario curriculum in the form
of enhanced opportunities for learning heritage languages for credit within the
school system. The clearest evidence of hard-core corporate pluralist philosophy
existed in the province’s affirmative action program set out in the Employment
Equity Act (1993), which at least implied, and probably necessitated, the legal
379
classification of employees by race and/or ethnicity. In December 1995, however,
legislation repealing the Act was passed by a newly elected Tory government
(Job Quotas Repeal Act, 1995). But the persistence of the essential structure of
the education system itself — a dichotomy composed of a public and a separate
(Roman Catholic) system — provides strong evidence of the diffidence of successive provincial governments regarding the place of corporate pluralism in
education, a diffidence no doubt heightened by dwindling government coffers.
Although the Rae NDP (New Democratic Party) government seemed most ideologically attuned to a corporate-pluralist agenda in general, it adopted the policy
of previous governments in refusing to fund private religiously based schools or
religious schools within the public system, thus fuelling the Adler and Bal
challenges.
Given the decisions in the four cases first considered above, it is probably fair
to propose the following generalizations:
First, the existence, nature, and funding of Roman Catholic separate schools
in Ontario represent an anomaly resulting from a political compromise struck in
order to create the Canadian confederation. As such, this unique constitutional
provision does not provide a legally useful precedent for other religious denominations.
Second, Ontario public schools are to be secular. Although it is permissible
to teach about religion in public schools, it is not permissible to support or
promote any particular religious view; to do so would inevitably violate the
religious freedom of students who do not share the view being supported or
promoted.
Third, the Ontario government is not required to provide public financial
support to any religious school (apart from its constitutional obligations to
Roman Catholic Schools), either inside or outside the public schools system.
Finally, given the ruling in Elgin, and obiter in Adler, it is not clear whether
the government has the constitutional authority to fund religious schools.
These generalizations lead to the inevitable conclusion that the courts favour
a liberal-pluralist approach. Although such a position clearly does not support an
assimilationist or indoctrinational approach to education (it supports educational
programs that encourage students to learn and appreciate other cultures and
cultural institutions), it has, to this point, fallen distinctly short of any active
attempt to promote ethnic and cultural diversity. It is probably also fair to
conclude from these cases that the courts have supported an individual rights, as
opposed to a group rights, approach to the resolution of these issues. When
individuals’ religious freedom was perceived to be threatened by educational
policy (e.g., Zylberberg and Elgin County), the courts found for the applicants;
when group rights were claimed (e.g., Adler and Bal) these rights were not
extended.
There is sparse evidence of judicial support for the corporate-pluralist agenda
of court-ordered official recognition of ethnic or religious groups within the
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education system. In fact, Adler and Bal seem to reject outright such a role for
the courts. The Adler court refused to mandate public funding for ethnically or
religiously oriented independent schools, whereas the court in Bal refused to
legitimize the operation of such schools or programs within the public system,
which the court characterized as having been “secularized” by the Elgin County
case. In the Divisional Court decision in Adler, Justice Anderson went out of his
way to characterize such questions as political ones to be answered by the
legislature.
Is the pending application by the Islamic Schools Federation doomed by the
reasoning in Adler and Bal? Perhaps it is. Insofar as the applicants are asking for
official recognition of particular religious holidays within the school system, they
appear to be seeking the introduction of a religious purpose into educational
policy and, concomitantly, the extension of a minority group’s rights. This
contradiction of the secularism underpinning Adler and Bal would seem to
determine the issue. However, it is conceivable that the court will characterize
the Regulation’s singling out of Christian religious holidays for special treatment
as an impermissible religious remnant requiring excision in order to complete the
secularization of the public school system. Quite possibly, then, the Ottawa
board’s accommodation of Jewish holidays opened the Pandora’s box that
appeared to have been firmly nailed shut by Adler and Bal. Perhaps it was naïve
to think the box could stay shut. The Ottawa challenge may thus end in the
court’s adopting the most pragmatic, and probably the best, solution — the
complete removal of any explicit religious referents in the public school holiday
regime. Certainly, Globe and Mail columnist Michael Valpy (1994) thinks this
would be the best alternative. Drawing on the ideas of Kymlicka (1989), Valpy
rejects the view that the state should promote an institutionalized culture, save
perhaps a shared history, and certainly not one encompassing religion, which, he
says, should be a matter of “private culture”:
Everyone’s history is not Canada’s history. The history of settlement, of how the instruments of social existence were constructed — the law, government, commerce, education
and so forth, is the history of Canada and should be the history of every one of us who
lives here.
Only with this shared history are we given a language to talk to each other about how
the country works, and only with it are we given reference points to enable us to make
decisions on the country’s future direction.
But religion?
University of Ottawa philosopher Will Kymlicka argues that, in a liberal society,
culture is a private matter. “The state,” he says, “does not oppose the freedom of people
to express their particular cultural attachments, but nor does it nurture such expression — rather . . . it responds with benign neutrality.”
Should schools close for religious holy days, which they do now for Christmas and
Easter? Should they close for Christian days and not for Jewish or Islamic or Orthodox?
I don’t think so. I think it’s time religion was relegated to private culture — or by consent,
381
and good planning, shared culture. . . . If you want your family to observe your own
religious holy days, pull your kids out of school — which is what the Jews have been
doing forever. It’s a no-fuss, no-muss idea. (p. A2)
In the context of a liberal-pluralist paradigm, in which the courts have
consistently supported the rights of the individual and refused to extend rights
to particular groups, no matter how small or large, this seems to be the only
reasonable solution. The four cases dealing with religion in Ontario’s public
schools reveal a clear judicial predilection towards enforcing a “benign neutrality” on the part of the state. Where the government’s laws, policies, or practices
appeared to give prominence to the religion of the majority, violations of the
religious freedom and equality rights of minority persons were found. By requiring the public system to be entirely secular, the courts have removed the
temptation — and indeed the very ability — to argue from a corporate-pluralist
platform that neutrality should be achieved by the state’s permitting and funding
religious education and schools, for all religious groups, both inside and outside
the public system, neutrality through balance. If anything is clear from these
cases, it is that Ontario courts are not about to order changes to the structure of
the Ontario education system to promote corporate pluralism. They were willing
implicitly to require structural changes to enforce French minority-language
educational rights (Marchand v. Simcoe County Board of Education et al., 1986;
Reference Re Education Act of Ontario and Minority Language Education Rights,
1984) but that was within the corporate-dualistic mould of section 23 of the
Charter. If the Ontario educational system is to be reconstituted on corporatepluralist lines, at least in regard to religion in the schools, it will need to be done
by the government itself. And, even then, it would be anybody’s guess whether
such a system would withstand constitutional scrutiny by a judiciary that has
shown itself increasingly wedded to the secularism of a church-state separation.
NOTES
1
This article is based on a paper we presented at the sixth annual conference of the Canadian
Association for the Practical Study of Law in Education (CAPSLE), held in Ottawa, Ontario on
23–25 April 1995.
2
The Supreme Court of Canada granted leave to appeal the Ontario Court of Appeal decision in
Adler. On 21 November 1996, the Supreme Court released its decision dismissing the appeal
(Adler v. Ontario, 1996).
3
The applicants appealed the decision of Winkler J. to the Ontario Court of Appeal. No judgment
appears to have been rendered as of November 1996.
4
As of November 1996 no decision had been reached in the case.
5
We are indebted to Robert Charney, counsel for the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General, for
pointing this out to us.
REFERENCES
Adler v. Ontario (1992), 9 O.R. (3d) 676 (Ont. Ct. — Gen. Div.).
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W. ROD DOLMAGE
Adler v. Ontario (Minister of Education) (1994), 19 O.R. (3d) 1 (C.A.).
Adler v. Ontario, [1996], S.C.J. No. 110.
Andrews v. Law Society of British Columbia, [1989] 1 S.C.R. 143.
Application in Islamic Schools Federation of Ontario v. Ottawa Board of Education, November 18,
1994, Ontario Court (General Division), Court File No. 84372/94.
Bal v. Ontario (1994), 21 O.R. (3d) 681 (Ont. Ct. — Gen. Div.).
Bissoondath, N. (1994). Selling illusions: The cult of multiculturalism in Canada. Toronto: Penguin.
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Part I of the Constitution Act, 1982, being Schedule B
of the Canada Act 1982 (U.K.), 1982, c.11.
Canadian Civil Liberties Association v. Ontario (Minister of Education) (1990), 71 O.R. (2d) 341
(C.A.).
Constitution Act, 1867, 30 & 31 Victoria, c.3.
Daly, R. (1994, September 6). School bell rings — for some. Toronto Star, pp. A1, A7.
Education Act, R.S.O. 1980, c.129.
Education Act, R.S.O. 1990, c.E.2.
Education Act, R.S.S. 1978, c.E-0.1.
Employment Equity Act, S.O. 1993, c.35.
Job Quotas Repeal Act, 1995, S.O. 1990, c.4.
Kymlicka, W. (1989). Liberalism, community, and culture. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1989.
Mahé et al v. Her Majesty the Queen in Right of the Province of Alberta (1990), 105 N.R. 321
(S.C.C.).
Marchand v. Simcoe County Board of Education et al. (1986), 55 O.R. (2d) 638 (H.C.J.).
Notice of Constitutional Question, filed in Islamic Schools Federation of Ontario et al. v. Ottawa
Board of Education, November 18, 1994, Ontario Court (General Division), Court File No.
84372/94.
Ontario Ministry of Education. (1991). Memorandum 112/1991. Toronto: Queen’s Printer.
Reference Re Bill 30, An Act to amend the Education Act (Ont.), [1987] 1 S.C.R. 1148.
Reference Re Education Act of Ontario and Minority Language Education Rights (1984), 47 O.R.
(2d) 1 (C.A.).
R. v. Big M Drug Mart Ltd., [1985] 1 S.C.R. 295.
R. v. Edwards Books, [1986] 2 S.C.R. 713.
R. v. Oakes, [1986] 1 S.C.R. 103.
Regulation 262, R.R.O. 1980.
Robertson and Rosetanni v. The Queen, [1963] S.C.R. 651.
Russow v. British Columbia (Attorney General) (1989), 35 B.C.L.R. (2d) 29 (S.C.).
Sarick, L. (1994, October 7). Lawsuit seeks Islamic holidays. Globe and Mail, pp. A1, A2.
Sheppard, C. (1993). Study paper on litigating the relationship between equity and equality. Toronto:
Ontario Law Reform Commission.
383
Syndicat de l’Enseignment de Champlaine v. Commission Scolaire Régionale de Chambly, [1994]
2 S.C.R. 525.
Valpy, M. (1994, June 17). Should schools close for religious days? Globe and Mail, p. A2.
Wirth, L. (1945). The problem of minority groups, In R. Linton (Ed.), The science of man in the
world crisis (pp. 347–372). New York: Columbia University Press.
Young, J. C. (1979). Education in a multicultural society: What sort of education? What sort of
society? Canadian Journal of Education, 4(3), 5–21.
Zylberberg et al v. Sudbury Board of Education (1988), 65 O.R. (2d) 641 (C.A.).
Greg M. Dickinson is a professor in and Chair of the Division of Educational Policy Studies, Faculty
of Education, University of Western Ontario, 1137 Western Road, London, Ontario, N6G 1G7. His
interests include law and education, and he is the Editor-in-Chief of Education & Law Journal
(Carswell). W. Rod Dolmage is a professor in the Faculty of Education, University of Regina,
Regina, Saskatchewan, S4S 0A2. His interests include educational administration and the politics of
education, and his most recent book is So You Want to Be a Teacher (Harcourt Brace, 1996).
Les pratiques d’évaluation des apprentissages
en salle de classe: perceptions des enseignantes
et des enseignants
Renée Forgette-Giroux
Marielle Simon
université d’ottawa
Afin de cerner les pratiques courantes d’évaluation des apprentissages en salle de classe,
les chercheuses ont interrogé des enseignantes et des enseignants de diverses régions de
l’Ontario afin de mieux connaître les modalités de leurs interventions et leurs besoins de
formation en la matière. Même si en général ils estiment s’acquitter convenablement de
cette tâche, leurs réponses témoignent d’un décalage important entre leurs pratiques
actuelles et celles que nécessitent Le programme d’études commun (MEFO, 1995). Les
préoccupations majeures des enseignantes et des enseignants se concentrent autour des
questions suivantes: le manque d’uniformité des pratiques et l’absence de directives
claires émanant des autorités scolaires à ce sujet, la nécessité d’évaluer les performances,
les compétences, les habiletés supérieures de la pensée et les attitudes, puis la pression
visant à impliquer les élèves dans le processus d’évaluation.
To identify standard practices for evaluating classroom learning, we questioned teachers
in various regions of Ontario about the kinds of evaluation methods they use and their
evaluation training needs. Although in general teachers consider themselves to be dealing
adequately with evaluation, their responses indicate that there is still a wide gap between
their current evaluation practices and those required by The Common Curriculum (Ontario
Ministry of Education and Training, 1995). Teachers are mainly concerned about (a) the
lack of uniformity in evaluation practices combined with the absence of clear instructions
on this subject from school authorities, and (b) the necessity to evaluate performance,
competencies, attitudes, and higher-order thinking skills, as well as the pressure to include
students in the evaluation process.
Le classement insatisfaisant des élèves américains et canadiens lors de plusieurs
enquêtes internationales et nationales a eu pour effet d’attirer l’attention sur les
stratégies d’enseignement et d’évaluation en salle de classe (Dwyer, 1990;
Shepard, 1989; Stiggins, 1988). Ces enquêtes conçues à des fins politiques et
administratives ont cependant fourni peu de renseignements sur la complexité du
processus, sur l’efficacité des stratégies d’évaluation privilégiées et sur l’utilité
des résultats fournis. Alors que la manière d’enseigner a beaucoup évolué,
l’évaluation des apprentissages fait encore souvent appel à des rites qui n’ont
plus rien de cohérent avec la pédagogie privilégiée dans les programmes d’études
384
REVUE CANADIENNE DE L’ÉDUCATION
21, 4 (1996): 384–395
LES PRATIQUES D’ÉVALUATION
385
actuels qui tendent vers le soutien des besoins psychologiques de l’élève (Caouette, 1992; Crooks, 1988; Spear, 1991; Wiggins, 1993). Le programme d’études
commun1 (Ministère de l’Éducation et de la Formation de l’Ontario, 1995), par
exemple, stipule que l’enseignante ou l’enseignant doit “avoir recours à une
grande variété de techniques d’évaluation” (p. 23) et que les comptes rendus
d’évaluation doivent “non seulement décrire les progrès mais prévoir des mesures
destinées à améliorer le rendement et à enrichir l’apprentissage de l’élève”
(p. 24). Les études récentes au sujet des pratiques d’évaluation en salle de classe
(Simon, Forgette-Giroux et Bercier-Larivière, 1993; Stiggins et Conklin, 1992;
Wilson, 1989) indiquent que la majorité des enseignantes et des enseignants
passent plus d’un tiers du temps d’enseignement à l’évaluation des apprentissages. Cette tâche est l’une des plus complexes et des plus déterminantes du
processus d’enseignement.
Dans le cadre de la présente étude, les chercheuses ont été invitées à collaborer avec des conseils scolaires afin de développer un plan de perfectionnement
destiné à actualiser les pratiques d’évaluation des enseignantes et des enseignants.
Dans ce contexte de partenariat, seule l’approche indirecte, c’est-à-dire un
questionnaire-enquête décrivant les pratiques telles que perçues par le personnel
enseignant, a pu être utilisée. Le but de cet article est de présenter les raisons
pour lesquelles les enseignantes et les enseignants évaluent, ce qu’ils évaluent et
comment ils le font. Cette étude vise également à identifier les éléments clés de
l’évaluation en salle de classe afin de guider l’observation systématique dans une
recherche ultérieure.
RECENSION DES ÉCRITS
En général, l’évaluation des apprentissages implique des décisions d’ordre
pédagogique (évaluation formative) et d’ordre administratif (évaluation sommative). Les décisions pédagogiques sont surtout orientées vers des fonctions de
diagnostic, d’accompagnement, de régulation, d’information ou de regroupement
par habiletés (Cardinet, 1992; Hargreaves et Earl, 1990; Wilson, 1989). Quant
aux décisions administratives elles se rapportent à des fonctions de sanction des
études, de certification, de sélection et de communication avec les parents
(Dorr-Bremme, 1983; Hoge et Coladarci, 1989; Stiggins, Frisbie et Griswold,
1989). Bien qu’en principe les résultats d’évaluation servent à de telles décisions,
en pratique l’évaluation se résume souvent à consigner des notes en vue du
bulletin (Bachor et Anderson, 1994; Conseil supérieur de l’éducation, 1992;
Simon, Forgette-Giroux et Bercier-Larivière, 1993). Même si les enseignantes et
les enseignants voient l’utilité de l’évaluation formative en salle de classe, ils en
font un usage minime (Dassa, Vasquez-Abad et Ajar, 1993; Desrosiers, Godbout
et Marzouk, 1992; Van Nieuwenhoven et Jonnaert, 1994).
L’analyse de différents instruments d’évaluation préparés par les enseignantes
386
RENÉE FORGETTE-GIROUX, MARIELLE SIMON ET MICHELINE B. LARIVIÈRE
et les enseignants révèle un manque d’équilibre entre l’évaluation des attitudes,
des connaissances, des compétences et des habiletés supérieures de la pensée tels
que la résolution de problèmes, le raisonnement scientifique, les techniques de
recherche et la pensée critique (Bateson, 1990; Fleming et Chambers, 1983;
McMorris et Boothroyd, 1993; Traub, Nagy, MacRury et Klaiman, 1988). En
effet, jusqu’à 90% du contenu des épreuves formelles (par exemple, tests papiercrayon) porte sur le rappel des connaissances et les enseignantes et les enseignants reconnaissent qu’ils ont de la difficulté à rédiger des questions faisant
appel aux habiletés supérieures. Bien qu’ils s’entendent pour dire que ce ne sont
pas seulement les connaissances qui doivent faire l’objet de l’évaluation, ils sont
loin d’avoir atteint un consensus sur les autres dimensions à évaluer, à savoir:
l’effort, la participation, les habitudes de travail et le cheminement ou le progrès.
Les modalités d’évaluation des élèves varient beaucoup d’un enseignant à
l’autre, d’une école et d’un niveau scolaire à l’autre et d’un ordre d’enseignement
à l’autre (élémentaire ou secondaire) (Anderson, 1989; Bachor et Anderson,
1994; Higgins et Rice, 1991; Stiggins et Conklin, 1992; Wilson, 1989). Par
exemple, à l’école primaire, les stratégies d’évaluation dites alternatives, comme
le dossier d’apprentissage (portfolio), l’observation structurée et spontanée font
davantage l’objet d’exploration et d’essai (Nicholson et Anderson, 1993). Par
ailleurs, au niveau secondaire, les apprentissages continuent d’être évalués à
partir de tests maison, d’examens et de travaux quotidiens et la note finale
constitue souvent une simple moyenne de tous les résultats d’évaluation recueillis
au cours d’une période donnée (Stiggins et Bridgeford, 1985). De plus, les
intervenantes et les intervenants scolaires perçoivent généralement l’évaluation
comme étant un processus distinct de celui de l’enseignement, ils négligent la
rétroaction et réinvestissent peu les résultats d’évaluation dans le processus
d’apprentissage (Conseil supérieur de l’éducation, 1992; Wilson, 1990). Ils font
peu appel à l’objectivation, à la réflexion et à l’autoévaluation en vue
d’encourager l’élève à prendre conscience de son apprentissage.
Une grande proportion d’enseignantes et d’enseignants n’ont reçu aucune
formation ou une formation peu utile aux besoins de la salle de classe (McMorris
et Boothroyd, 1993). Par exemple, Dassa, Vasquez-Abad et Ajar (1993) ont
constaté que 83% des enseignantes et enseignants interrogés n’ont jamais suivi
un cours de base en évaluation des apprentissages. En Ontario, ce pourcentage
se situe entre 25% et 50% (Ministère de l’Éducation de l’Ontario, 1992a, 1992b,
1992c). C’est donc à partir de leur expérience pratique que les enseignantes et
les enseignants développent leurs stratégies d’évaluation des apprentissages
(Anderson, 1989; Gullickson, 1984; Stiggins et Conklin, 1992).
Plusieurs recherches récentes attestent de la nécessité d’étudier de manière
plus systématique la question des pratiques d’évaluation des apprentissages en
salle de classe (Bercier-Larivière et Forgette-Giroux, 1995; McMorris et Boothroyd, 1993; Spear, 1991). La diffusion des résultats de recherches et d’enquêtes
387
sur le rendement scolaire incite les autorités politiques et les conseils scolaires
à mieux cerner les pratiques d’évaluation en vigueur et à déterminer plus précisément les besoins du personnel enseignant en cette matière. Ainsi, au cours des
dernières années, plusieurs conseils scolaires de langue française en Ontario ont
fait appel à des experts en vue d’analyser leurs besoins. Ce désir de connaître les
besoins de leur personnel enseignant en évaluation des apprentissages et l’intérêt
des auteures à vouloir préciser davantage l’état des pratiques actuelles d’évaluation ont permis de décrire les finalités de l’évaluation, les modalités privilégiées
et d’arriver à préciser les compétences et les besoins de formation perçus par le
personnel enseignant.
MÉTHODOLOGIE
Population et échantillon
Le personnel enseignant de la 7e année jusqu’à la fin du secondaire en Ontario
constitue la population de l’enquête. L’échantillon provient de 19 conseils
scolaires ou sections de langue française du centre, de l’est et du nord de la
province. Le choix des sujets s’est fait sur une base intentionnelle et volontaire,
soit dans le contexte d’ateliers de formation mis sur pied par les chercheuses, soit
lors de sondages menés par les conseils auprès de l’ensemble du personnel
enseignant. La participation varie de 2 à 80 sujets par conseil, selon la nature des
regroupements. Il s’agit d’enseignantes et d’enseignants ressources (n=41), de
l’ensemble du personnel de 7e, 8e et 9e années (n=141) et des personnes présentes aux ateliers d’évaluation offerts par leur conseil (n=139). Une quarantaine
d’entre eux oeuvrent au niveau de la 10e, 11e et 12e année. Puisque les analyses
statistiques n’ont révélé aucune différence significative entre les résultats de ces
divers groupes, les données ont été analysées globalement.
Les 321 participantes et participants à l’étude ont en moyenne 13 années
d’expérience dans la profession et la moitié sont des femmes. La majorité disent
avoir reçu un minimum de préparation formelle à l’évaluation des apprentissages,
soit lors de la formation initiale, soit au niveau de la maîtrise en éducation. Ils
ont par la suite développé leurs compétences à partir de discussions avec des
collègues, de lectures personnelles ou en participant à des ateliers.
Questionnaire
La collecte de données a été réalisée à partir d’un questionnaire-sondage traitant
des aspects suivants de l’évaluation: finalités, modalités, compétence et besoins
de formation. Ce questionnaire a été élaboré à partir des résultats d’études sur
les pratiques d’évaluation (Bateson, 1990; Gravel, 1991; Stiggins et Conklin,
1992) et a été révisé et approuvé par le personnel administratif des conseils
participants afin d’en assurer la validité. La version finale du questionnaire
388
comporte 26 questions. En plus de fournir certaines données démographiques, des
questions à choix multiples et de type Likert traitent des quatre dimensions
susmentionnées. Enfin, 2 questions ouvertes portent sur les perceptions des forces
et des faiblesses générales des pratiques actuelles d’évaluation des apprentissages.
La recherche s’est effectuée sur une période d’un an et demi. Les chercheuses
ont elles-mêmes distribué les questionnaires au début des ateliers de développement professionnel qu’elles ont offerts en évaluation des apprentissages. Les
enseignantes et les enseignants ont pris en moyenne 30 minutes pour le remplir.
Lors des sessions, les chercheuses ont noté systématiquement toutes les questions
et tous les commentaires des participantes et des participants et ont retenu les
éléments communs à tous les groupes. L’ensemble des données a été analysé par
le biais d’analyses descriptives: distribution de fréquences, pourcentage, moyenne
pondérée et analyse de contenu. Bien qu’elles comportent des limites en termes
de généralisation, ces analyses ont permis de tracer un portrait global des pratiques d’évaluation des apprentissages et de préciser les besoins particuliers de
formation.
RÉSULTATS
Finalités de l’évaluation
Les enseignantes et les enseignants disent évaluer principalement dans le but de
mieux connaître les élèves, de les motiver, d’obtenir un indice de la qualité de
leur enseignement et de mieux connaître le groupe classe (voir le tableau 1).
TABLEAU 1
Finalités de l’évaluation:
Raisons pour lesquelles l’évaluation est utilisée (N=321)
Raisons proposées
Mieux connaître les élèves
Obtenir un indice de la qualité de
l’enseignement
Motiver les élèves
Accumuler les notes au bulletin
Satisfaire aux exigences administratives
Faciliter le regroupement selon les
habiletés
Mieux connaître le groupe-classe
Nombre total de réponses
1re raison
2e raison
3e raison
101
72
34
51
40
49
40
37
34
50
27
25
45
32
17
19
25
42
17
299
59
298
65
284
389
Un bon nombre d’entre eux signalent la difficulté de motiver les élèves lorsque
les travaux ne comptent pas au bulletin. Pour eux la note est nécessaire pour
amener les élèves à travailler et pour répondre aux exigences administratives
comme en témoignent les commentaires suivants: “on évalue peut-être pour les
mauvaises raisons, c’est-à-dire besoin de notes pour le bulletin . . . c’est encore
le bulletin qui demeure l’outil principal . . . malheureusement nous sommes
limités et esclaves de celui-ci.”
Lorsque interrogé-es sur les raisons pour faire de l’évaluation formative
(figure 1), les enseignantes et les enseignants disent s’en servir pour ajuster
l’enseignement selon les habiletés (73%), dépister les difficultés d’apprentissage
(65%) et responsabiliser les élèves (63%). Soulignons que 36% déclarent se
servir de l’évaluation formative pour recueillir des notes de façon continue.
Quant à l’objet de l’évaluation, 91% des participantes et des participants
admettent évaluer les connaissances, 98% les habiletés ou les performances et
73% les attitudes. En général les répondantes et les répondants prétendent que
les instruments d’évaluation qu’ils élaborent servent avant tout à évaluer les
habiletés supérieures de la pensée. Une étude plus poussée des pratiques permettrait de valider les réponses obtenues car, comme les commentaires suivants
l’indiquent, les enseignantes et les enseignants demeurent préoccupés par la
FIGURE 1
Raisons invoquées pour faire de l’évaluation formative:
pourcentage de réponses pour chacune (N=321)
390
difficulté d’évaluer davantage les habiletés cognitives complexes, les compétences et les attitudes: “On n’évalue pas les attitudes, les méthodes de travail, les
élèves veulent des notes . . . On insiste trop sur les connaissances — mémorisation.”
Modalités d’évaluation
Selon les réponses recueillies, l’évaluation des apprentissages occuperait près du
tiers du temps d’enseignement, ce qui confirme les résultats des études recensées.
Entre 80% et 88% des enseignantes et des enseignants affirment que les apprentissages des élèves sont le plus souvent évalués au moyen de travaux quotidiens,
d’épreuves et de travaux majeurs (tableau 2). Ces derniers font référence à des
travaux de recherche ou de documentation pouvant s’échelonner sur plusieurs
semaines.
À des questions supplémentaires concernant les caractéristiques de leurs
stratégies d’évaluation, les enseignantes et les enseignants indiquent avoir recours
à des questions à réponses ouvertes courtes (82%) et à des réponses ouvertes
élaborées (65%). Un peu plus de la moitié (59%) des personnes consultées
rapportent faire appel à l’observation spontanée (observation non structurée sous
forme de questionnement ponctuel, survol des cahiers ou des travaux, etc.),
comparativement à 44% qui ont recours à l’observation structurée ou formelle
(par exemple, l’utilisation des grilles d’observation, listes de vérification, etc.).
Bien qu’environ 80% de l’échantillon jugent la qualité de leurs examens “bonne”
ou “très bonne”, ils s’inquiètent du manque d’uniformité dans leurs pratiques. À
cet effet, un répondant rapporte par exemple que: “chaque enseignant évalue à
sa manière donc la note ne veut plus rien dire.”
TABLEAU 2
Modalités d’évaluation: moyens utilisés pour évaluer (N=321)
Moyens proposés
Fréquences relatives
Travaux et devoirs quotidiens
88%
Examens et tests périodiques
85%
Projets et travaux majeurs
81%
Observation spontanée
59%
Questionnement oral
54%
Observation systématique
44%
Épreuves fournies dans les trousses
18%
391
De plus, le niveau de participation des élèves au processus d’évaluation
demeure relativement faible. Seulement 45% des enseignantes et des enseignants
interrogés invitent les élèves à s’autoévaluer et moins du quart d’entre eux (23%)
disent faire participer les élèves aux décisions relatives à leur évaluation (par
exemple: déterminer le contenu à évaluer, indiquer le poids relatif des sections,
identifier les critères de correction). Ils appliquent peu l’évaluation des apprentissages par les pairs (40%) et par le groupe-classe (25%). Leurs commentaires
démontrent cependant une attitude positive à cet égard. En effet, ils aimeraient
pouvoir mieux impliquer et responsabiliser l’élève afin d’assurer une meilleure
transparence au moment de l’évaluation.
Compétences et besoins de formation
Lorsque interrogés sur leurs connaissances dans le domaine de l’évaluation des
apprentissages, bon nombre d’enseignantes et d’enseignants affirment bien
connaître l’évaluation formative (76%) et l’évaluation sommative (84%). Par
ailleurs, entre 40% et 50% des participantes et des participants estiment que leurs
connaissances de l’interprétation critériée et normative sont passables. Leurs
remarques témoignent cependant d’un besoin d’évoluer et de parfaire leurs
connaissances dans ces domaines.
Ils expliquent également que la faiblesse majeure de l’évaluation des apprentissages provient de la difficulté de varier et d’adapter les méthodes d’évaluation
aux besoins individuels des élèves à l’intérieur de groupes-classes hétérogènes
et que le besoin de formation le plus évident concerne l’intégration de l’évaluation aux activités d’apprentissage ainsi que l’approche formative de l’évaluation.
Aussi proposent-ils en ordre décroissant d’importance les choix d’ateliers
suivants: stratégies d’intégration de l’évaluation à l’activité d’apprentissage,
stratégies d’évaluation formative, évaluation des attitudes et des compétences,
élaboration d’instruments de mesure, et en toute fin, participation des élèves au
processus d’évaluation.
CONCLUSION
Les enseignantes et les enseignants décrivent généralement leurs pratiques
d’évaluation des apprentissages comme une accumulation de notes. Selon eux,
évaluer signifie “noter” et le bulletin conditionne leurs pratiques d’évaluation. Il
faut mentionner ici que les réponses obtenues ne permettent pas de savoir dans
quelle mesure leur évaluation facilite l’apprentissage de l’élève et conduit à des
prises de décisions éclairées. Auraient-ils tendance à évaluer dans le but de
contraindre l’élève à travailler et à se mériter des notes satisfaisantes sur son
bulletin?
Bien que les enseignantes et les enseignants reconnaissent l’importance d’évaluer les connaissances, les compétences et les attitudes et qu’ils disent le faire,
392
les commentaires des personnes consultées ainsi que les discussions suscitées
autour de ces termes révèlent une confusion apparente lors de leur utilisation et
de leur interprétation. Au niveau des habiletés affectives, par exemple, ils distinguent mal entre l’évaluation des habitudes de travail des élèves (persévérance,
minutie, respect, autonomie, coopération) et l’évaluation de leurs qualités morales. Des ateliers de formation sur l’évaluation des attitudes contribueraient à
préciser ces concepts.
Quant aux modalités d’évaluation, les enseignantes et les enseignants réclament des directives précises de la part des autorités scolaires concernant les
stratégies à privilégier. Comme ils s’intéressent à la participation plus active des
élèves au processus d’évaluation, il serait intéressant de vérifier dans quelle
mesure ils distinguent entre l’autoévaluation et la simple utilisation de listes de
bonnes réponses annexées à certains manuels scolaires. L’implication de l’élève
à toutes les étapes de l’évaluation pourrait l’amener à développer une attitude
positive à l’égard de l’apprentissage, à le responsabiliser davantage et à le
motiver à réussir (Doyon et Juneau, 1991; Mc Iver, 1988; Mitchell, 1992; Slavin,
1980; Wiggins, 1993).
Finalement, la préférence pour des ateliers portant sur les besoins élémentaires
en évaluation des apprentissages confirme les lacunes importantes à ce niveau.
Cependant, toute intervention en ce domaine demeurera inefficace si elle ne
présente aucun scénario d’intégration de l’évaluation à l’acte pédagogique et au
processus d’apprentissage.
Les enseignantes et les enseignants reconnaissent l’importance d’évaluer les
connaissances, les compétences et les attitudes, d’avoir recours à l’évaluation
formative et sommative et de varier le type d’instrument de mesure. Toutefois,
en pratique, ils semblent évaluer principalement à des fins administratives plutôt
qu’à des fins pédagogiques. Une étude systématique orientée vers l’observation
directe des pratiques d’évaluation en salle de classe préciserait davantage et
documenterait plusieurs constatations, entre autres la nature et le rôle de la note,
les pratiques d’évaluation des composantes affectives et psychomotrices et les
schèmes d’interprétation. Certains enseignants et enseignantes s’interrogent
également sur l’équité de leurs pratiques et plusieurs soulignent le besoin de les
uniformiser. Pour ce faire, ils demandent des directives claires sur les modalités
d’évaluation et une formation en conséquence.
Le manque d’uniformité dans les pratiques, la connaissance limitée de notions
élémentaires en évaluation des apprentissages et l’intérêt pour des stratégies dites
alternatives semblent dus en grande partie à une formation déficiente et à l’absence de cadre conceptuel situant l’évaluation dans le processus d’enseignement.
Il serait intéressant d’étudier la relation entre la quantité et la qualité (nature) de
formation en évaluation et la qualité des pratiques d’évaluation en salle de classe.
L’élaboration d’un modèle théorique élucidant de tels liens préciserait les influences diverses sur le système de valeurs guidant les pratiques d’évaluation, les
393
pratiques préconisées et opérationnelles ainsi que leurs répercussions sur le
rendement scolaire.
NOTE
1
Le PEC (Programme d’études commun; MEFO, 1995) est le fondement d’une nouvelle façon
d’aborder l’apprentissage et l’enseignement en Ontario. Tout l’apprentissage étant axé sur les
résultats, le personnel enseignant doit constamment évaluer les progrès qu’accomplit chaque élève
à partir de situations d’apprentissage authentiques afin de développer des compétences transdisciplinaires.
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Renée Forgette-Giroux et Marielle Simon sont professeures, et Micheline Bercier-Larivière est
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Ottawa (Ontario) K1N 6P5.
International Comparisons of Student
Achievement in Mathematics and Science:
Philip Nagy
ontario institute for studies in education of the university of toronto
International testing programs in mathematics and science require careful interpretation.
The major difficulties in such tests include test content substructure, the meaning of
composite scores, the difficulty of measuring opportunity-to-learn, and the choice of test
content. Valid interpretations must contend with inherent limitations to international
comparisons, such as differing value systems, the differences among countries, and
differences in enrolment rates. Opportunity-to-learn ought to be given as much importance
as achievement data. At the high school level, achievement must be interpreted in the
context of enrolment. Canada’s performance, in light of the these concerns, appears better
than some critics have suggested.
Les programmes de tests internationaux en mathématiques et en sciences requièrent une
interprétation judicieuse. Les principales difficultés que posent ces tests sont, entre autres,
la sous-structure de leur contenu, la signification des scores composites, l’évaluation des
possibilités d’apprentissage et le choix du contenu des tests. Pour être valables, les
interprétations doivent tenir compte des limites inhérentes aux comparaisons internationales, en raison par exemple des divers systèmes de valeurs, des différences entre les pays
et des écarts entre les taux de scolarité. On devrait accorder autant d’importance aux
possibilités d’apprentissage qu’aux données relatives au rendement scolaire. Au niveau
de l’école secondaire, le rendement doit être interprété en fonction des taux de scolarité.
La performance du Canada, à la lumière de ces considérations, semble meilleure que
certains critiques donnent à penser.
The published results of comparative studies in mathematics and science across
various countries may help both academics and laypersons to understand important educational issues. But those studies are very complex, and the task of
interpreting the results requires extraordinary care (as their authors often suggest). Although the academic community, in general, is aware of the difficulties
in interpreting those results, some members of the public are not so cautious.
Great disparities exist between the original studies (and related specialist literature) and the media and political responses to those studies. This gap between
academic and public views is a cause for concern.
There are two reasons for this gap. Some politicians are blind to issues that
do not suit their purposes. “We cannot escape,” Burstein (1993b) contended, “the
ideological use and misuse of cross-national data for political purposes. We can
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21, 4 (1996): 396–413
INTERNATIONAL ACHIEVEMENT IN MATHEMATICS AND SCIENCE
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only hope to overwhelm the most base misrepresentations with the wealth of
knowledge and understanding international studies provide” (p. xxxi). In addition,
the media often do not take a balanced view of this type of educational data
(Bracey, 1994, 1996). On the other hand, the reports themselves may be partially
responsible for misinterpretation: they are often written in a language impenetrable to non-specialists.
In assessing international reports, I separate carefully the curriculum provided
to students (a feature known as the “opportunity-to-learn” [OTL]), from the
actual results of international tests written by students (the “achievement data”).
Because curricula vary greatly across countries, and coverage of content within
tests is never uniform, judgements based exclusively on achievement data, without taking into account OTL, may be unfair. Although those researchers who
report the results of achievement test data are aware of this distinction, commentators who try to interpret the researchers’ findings often ignore it.
STUDIES IN MATHEMATICS AND SCIENCE
The International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement
(IEA) has conducted two mathematics and two science studies, and is currently
engaged in a third study of both. (They have also done studies in other subject
areas.) The studies of mathematics and science are:
(a) First International Mathematics Study (FIMS) — a test of 13-year-olds and
students in the last year of secondary school in 12 countries (Husén, 1967).
(b) First International Science Study (FISS) — a test of 10-year-olds, 14-yearolds, and students in the last year of secondary school in 19 countries
(Comber & Keeves, 1973).
(c) Second International Mathematics Study (SIMS) — a test of 13-year-olds
and students in the last year of secondary school in 22 countries (Burstein,
1993a; Robitaille & Garden, 1989; Travers & Westbury, 1989).
(d) Second International Science Study (SISS) — a test of 10-year-olds,
14-year-olds, and students in the last year of secondary school in 23
countries (IEA, 1988; Keeves, 1992; Postlethwaite & Wiley, 1992; Rosier
& Keeves, 1991).
(e) Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) (in progress) — a test of 9-year-olds, 13-year-olds, and those in the final year of
secondary school, in approximately 50 countries (Robitaille et al., 1993).
The International Assessment of Education Progress (IAEP) has conducted two
studies, the first covering both science and mathematics in one volume, and the
second devoting a separate volume to each subject:
(f)
First IAEP study (IAEP-1) — a test of 13-year-olds in six countries (including seven Canadian jurisdictions) (Lapointe, Mead, & Phillips, 1989).
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(g)
(h)
PHILIP NAGY
Second IAEP study (mathematics) (IAEP-2M) — a test of 9-year-olds and
13-year-olds in 21 countries (including 14 different Canadian jurisdictions)
(Lapointe, Mead, & Askew, 1992).
Second IAEP study (science) (IAEP-2S) — a test of 9-year-olds and
13-year-olds in 21 countries (including 14 different Canadian jurisdictions)
(Lapointe, Askew, & Mead, 1992).
All of the studies cited have collected data in addition to achievement results.
As well, some “countries” are, in fact, smaller jurisdictions.
My main focus is on SIMS, SISS, and the two IAEP studies; Canada was not
involved in FIMS or FISS, and TIMSS staff have released preliminary results
just as this article is going to press. Some problems raised concerning SISS and
SIMS are being addressed by TIMSS, but my primary concern is difficulties in
the interpretation of existing written reports and the influence of those reports on
policy.
DIFFICULTIES IN TEST CONSTRUCTION AND DESIGN
There is wide agreement that the results of IAEP-1, for example, are questionable. “Because of the small sample size and acknowledged methodological
problems,” Rotberg (1990) claims, “this assessment was labelled a ‘pilot’ —
although this label has not been reflected in the public rhetoric about the results”
(p. 298). McLean (1990) refers to it as “badly flawed” (p. 10) and similarly,
Goldstein (1993) states:
Despite a caveat in the introductory section, there is little in this same report which tries
to convey the tentative nature of international comparisons, and the problems of translation and interpretation which are well recognised by those responsible for designing and
analysing the assessments. (p. 19)
The major difficulty with the IAEP-1 results may be traced to a difference in
purpose between it and the IEA studies. Noting the time and money needed for
content definition and item development in IEA studies, the IAEP-1 study
investigated the feasibility of re-using NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) questions and procedures (hence the label “pilot”). Existing
NAEP items were selected and submitted for OTL judgements to the nine jurisdictions that agreed to participate. Although those trying to economize should not
be criticized for taking such steps, their failure to be more forthcoming about
limitations of the “quick and efficient” methodology led to the complaints by
Goldstein (1993), McLean (1990), Rotberg (1990), and Wolfe (1989). Wolfe’s
analysis (see also Goldstein, 1991) demonstrates one way in which such shortcuts
yielded questionable results.
Goldstein (1993) further contends that “the very notion of reporting comparisons in terms of a single scale, for example of ‘mathematics’ or ‘science,’ is
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misleading” (p. 20). Providing aggregate scores, however much the public may
demand them, may encourage unsound conclusions. But if authors of reports do
not provide such scores, they risk having a third party produce a simplistic
summary with more appeal to non-specialists. Producing digestible but not
simplistic summaries of results is a difficult task that requires both effort and
care. To date, only SIMS has managed to avoid the misleading single scales to
which Goldstein points; the others invite simplistic one-dimensional conclusions.
DIFFICULTIES WITH TEST CONTENT
In assessing an aggregate score on these tests, it is important to understand the
actual make-up of the tests and the relative weighting of subtopics within tests.
In IAEP-1, for example, the relative sizes of subtests determined relative
weighting of subtopics in the aggregate score. The mathematics test had six
subscales, ranging from 6 to 24 items: “numbers and operations” (24 items) was
treated as four times as important as “relations, functions and algebraic
expressions” (6 items) and three times as important as “problem solving” (8
items). But when Wolfe (1989) adjusted the relative weighting of the subtests to
something more balanced, he changed the ranking of countries. In particular, the
standing of the U.K., which had low OTL for the longest subtest, improved
markedly when less weight was given to this subtopic. Whether the British ought
to deal more with this subtopic is another issue; the analysis simply shows that
the actual items do make a big difference. (L. McLean [personal communication,
1995] notes that Educational Testing Service, who conducted the IAEP studies,
disputes Wolfe’s conclusions, as well as objections raised in McLean [1990].)
Consider another example on the importance of content weighting. When
Burstein (1993b), using data from SIMS, took each of eight countries, and “constructed” retrospectively a test consisting only of items with at least 80% OTL
rating by that country, and compared all countries on each test, he found the
rank-order on the tests he constructed was substantially different from the rankorder on the original common test. In every case, the rank was higher for each
country when the basis for test construction was 80% OTL within that country.
International differences in OTL raise a related concern. If a country decides
not to teach topics that other countries do teach, then that decision should be
discussed as seriously as the fact that students do not perform very well on topics
they have not been taught. Indeed, this issue was the theme of the U.S. report on
SIMS (McKnight et al., 1987). In Burstein’s reconstructed test, the list of items
for Japan was easily the longest, because that country teaches more of the
mathematics on the IEA test than any other. Thus, the total SIMS test favoured
Japan, a fact that was considered in interpreting all results in the SIMS report
(Burstein, 1993a).
In summary, test content and OTL data are important. Changing content can
change national ranking, and serious interpretation of the data must be at the
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subtopic level. At the same time, political reality obliges investigators to report
some sort of total scores. Consequently, the challenge is to find the most meaningful and least misleading scores.
DIFFICULTIES IN MEASURING OPPORTUNITY TO LEARN
To measure OTL, all that is required, in principle, is a judgement such as “fully
taught,” “partly taught,” or “not taught.” But in practice such judgements are
questionable, largely because countries vary so widely in their educational
structures. Whereas central officials in countries with tightly prescribed curricula
assess the intended curriculum for testing purposes, in other countries teacher
surveys are used to identify the implemented curriculum. Such varied information
is difficult to compare. (One could even argue that students are in the best
position to judge OTL.)
In addition, conditions for OTL judgement have not always been ideal. Details
in the information provided to judges have not been specific enough for accurate
judgements. In SISS and IAEP-2, decisions were made on quite general descriptions of items, rather than the items themselves. In SISS, for example, one
biology topic was “metabolism of the organism,” whereas the “detail” given to
the judges was “metabolism in organisms and the structural adaptations involved.” This difficulty can be solved, at some cost, by collecting judgements on
actual items. SIMS collected such data, and TIMSS is doing so as well (Robitaille et al., 1993).
Finally, a peculiarly Canadian issue. OTL in SISS varied considerably across
provinces, making the notion of national-level OTL suspect: “The diversity in
curriculum found in Canada,” Crocker (1989) contends, “leads to a serious
question of whether interprovincial achievement comparisons can have any
meaning” (p. 33).
DIFFICULTIES IN THE CHOICE OF CONTENT FOR INTERNATIONAL TESTS
If uniformly high agreement on OTL is required, international variation precludes
producing a test of any length. In order to proceed, a compromise has been
struck (Plomp, 1992): some consistency in OTL, reasonable content coverage,
and insistence that the data be interpreted only in light of OTL. But the results
of such a compromise were soon evident. Schmidt and Valverde (1995), for
example, report that in mathematics at the Grade 4–5 level (TIMSS), no topic
was reported as “substantially covered” by more than 70% of the 50 or so
participating countries. (This finding flies in the face of the common perception
that basic mathematics is basic mathematics.)
For science, little of the modernization of science curricula that took place
between FISS and SISS (e.g., Merrill & Ridgway, 1969) reached the final SISS,
with the result that the test was biased against countries in which significant
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curriculum reform had taken place. For example, one goal of SISS was to allow
comparisons with FISS, conducted twelve years earlier. SISS began with the 53
FISS content categories, but despite tremendous upheaval in science education
in the intervening years, only four new categories could be agreed on. Crocker
(1989) notes that there is rarely disagreement on what to put in a test; the issue,
rather, is what to leave out. Traditional content is accepted much more readily
than newer topics.
Theisen, Achola, and Boakari (1983) note that if an education system is
geared to turning out “predetermined labor quotas” (p. 63) through national
exams, it will have a more standardized curriculum. In that event, comparisons
with more flexible systems will be misleading. One system may be geared to
factual knowledge and test-taking skill, and another to student self-selection into
areas of interest and ability.
Finally, attempts to examine growth by comparing different age groups on the
same items do not speak well for the curricular validity of the test. SISS attempted such a comparison, with the result that the 14-year-old population wrote a
core test of 30 items, all but two of which were judged suitable for and administered to either the 10-year-old or the end-of-secondary-school sample as well.
DIFFICULTIES CAUSED BY DIFFERENT SOCIAL CONDITIONS IN PARTICIPATING
COUNTRIES
Even among relatively similar countries, achievement data should be interpreted
in light of social and economic differences. For example, countries differ in their
patterns of immigration, with the result that some have more varied language
mixes than others. Those in which the language spoken at home is different from
that used in school tend to score relatively poorly on achievement tests (Elley,
1992).1 Canada has one of the highest proportions of such students (Robitaille
& Garden, 1989; Rosier & Keeves, 1991).
Although social variables do not constitute an excuse for poor results, they are
a major contextual feature. Jaeger (1992) recently interpreted performance on
international tests (mostly FIMS and SIMS) of the United States, Germany, and
Japan, in light of varying socio-economic conditions among the three countries.
He notes that from 30% to 60% of achievement variance can be “predicted by
the poverty rate among children in single-parent households” (p. 122), and cites
similar figures for the influence of divorce rates and part-time employment on
achievement. He then provides comparative data for the three countries, such as
the percentage of children in single-parent families: 25% in the U.S.A. (with a
50% poverty rate), 14% in Germany (with a 36% poverty rate), and 6% in Japan
(no poverty figure was given for Japan). He also analyzes the relative influence
of different variables on achievement, concluding: “economic factors, coupled
with family structure and stability, predict substantial portions of between-nation
variation in math and science test scores . . . classroom instructional variables
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PHILIP NAGY
predict but trivial portions” (p. 124). Even without Canadian data, Jaeger’s
analysis is relevant.
Nevertheless, despite these factors, poor educational achievement is seen (by
some) as entirely the fault of the schools. Jaeger observes, for example, that there
is more debate in the U.S.A. over being behind a half-dozen countries in
achievement than there is about considerably poorer medical ratings (e.g., being
ranked 28th best in percentage of low-birth-weight children). Although society
recognizes poor health as a symptom of broader societal problems, and doctors
are not blamed, it does not recognize poor school achievement as rooted in
similar problems.
DIFFICULTIES IN THE LANGUAGE OF TEST ITEMS
A further limitation in international studies is that the tests are written in a wide
variety of languages to accommodate participating countries. There are inherent
difficulties crossing languages and cultures that no amount of effort or expense
can eliminate. Most tests were written first in English, then translated, and finally
checked by means of back-translations. Although translation procedures are
improving, languages do not map onto each other without problems (Goldstein,
1993): a word in one language may differ in precise meaning and level of
abstractness in another, with the result that item difficulty may vary across
languages. Some differences are more cultural than linguistic — for example,
some currency systems do not use decimals, so that an arithmetic item concerning, say, $1.45, cannot be translated into a corresponding item of similar
difficulty in all currencies. Although translation difficulties do not account for
large systematic differences in achievement, they do raise concerns about levels
of error in the data.
DIFFICULTIES IN SCHOOL ENROLMENT PATTERNS
Secondary school achievement data should be interpreted in light of enrolment
and retention. Beyond the age of compulsory schooling, countries differ enormously in the proportion of the age cohort in school, in the proportion who take
mathematics or science, and in the types of schools they attend. According to
SISS, the U.S.A., Korea, Japan, and Canada, in that order, had the highest
retention rates of students to end-of-high-school age. However, Korea and Japan
had substantial numbers of these students in technical or vocational schools not
sampled by SISS (Postlethwaite & Wiley, 1992, p. 6). Consequently, samples
vary in their degree of elitism.2 The proportion of the age group that were
eligible to be sampled varied from 80% for the U.S.A. to 18% for Hungary.
Canada was at 68%, Israel and Japan over 60%, and all others below 42%. Only
the U.S. sample was less elite than the Canadian.
Even more marked are the differences in proportion of students who take
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advanced science. Figure 1 shows a plot of achievement versus enrolment as a
proportion of the age group, in biology for 18-year-olds. Failing to consider
enrolment differences results in such anomalous comparisons as between the 45%
of 18-year-old Finnish students who take biology and the 5% in Hungary,
England, or Singapore. Although such comparisons are clearly inappropriate, they
occur in many interpretations of international data for an age when school
attendance and subject selection are optional. English Canada3 has either the
highest (chemistry) or second-highest (biology, physics) enrolment of the age
group in SISS, and, thus, low achievement compared to more elite systems. The
SISS authors offer cautions on this point, but fail to heed their own cautions in
all major analyses.
SISS produced a secondary analysis of comparable small percentages of elite
students. The authors clearly state that the analysis is an examination of the
effect of teaching in high-achieving homogeneous groups (Postlethwaite &
Wiley, 1992, p. 70), but the data have been misinterpreted by the Economic
Council of Canada (as cited in Freedman, 1993, p. 12) as achievement adjusted
for retention rate. A comparison of one country’s very best students taught in
homogeneous groups with another country’s best taught in heterogeneous groups
is an examination of streaming. To claim that this comparison “adjusts” achievement for retention — in effect, that all other factors are equal — is to miss the
point. How students are grouped is the major factor; it has not been equalized in
this comparison.
Postlethwaite and Wiley (1992) conclude that something may be gained by
homogeneous grouping of elite students. But their argument raises the question
of whether it is better to achieve excellent results with a small group, or to settle
for lower achievement with a larger group. If Canada’s economic problems are
caused by the lack of large numbers of well-trained workers for a modern economy, then surely the issue is not how well the top 5% of students are educated,
but rather how successfully the top half or more of all students are educated.
Fail to consider retention and enrolment when examining secondary achievement data does a major disservice to secondary students and educators.
DIFFICULTIES CAUSED BY SAMPLING AND PARTICIPATION RATES
The differences across countries in how seriously they participate in international
studies cannot be ignored. Data in international studies are collected by sampling,
and agreement to participate varies across countries, generally from high in
totalitarian countries to low in democracies. Schools preoccupied with their own
upcoming and more important testing, such as external examinations, have tended
to decline the invitation.
It is difficult to interpret the effect on comparative results of these differences
across countries. Schmidt, Wolfe, and Kifer (1993) report that only 30% of the
original targeted sample for SIMS in the U.S.A. agreed to participate, and the
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405
rest of the sample was made up of “similar” schools. According to Jaeger (1992),
commenting on the 71% and 74% response rates in the U.S.A. for FIMS,
“response rates of the U.S. samples were below the threshold that is regarded as
adequate” by the National Center for Educational Statistics (p. 119). If 75%
response rate is the criterion, then one-quarter of the countries, including Canada,
would be eliminated from SISS.
Differences in participation across countries may reflect national interest or
pride in doing well. This interpretation is supported by comments in the IAEP-2S
report, with respect to Korea: “The feeling of self-discipline and serious attention
to what they are about carries over into the assessment activity . . . at this age,
12, 13, 14, students are expected to be responsible for their own serious behavior” (Lapointe, Askew & Mead, 1992, p. 24). Compare this attitude with the
much more relaxed expectations Canadians have of young teens. Although these
difficulties are impossible to quantify, they form part of the context for interpreting international differences.
DIFFICULTIES IN TEST AND SCORE ACCURACY
In general, levels of error reported for international tests are underestimates, and
the claimed level of accuracy is an overestimate. The procedure used for estimating error rightly treats the students tested as a sample of the population of
students in the country, but it does not make similar assumptions for the test
itself. (Items chosen should be considered to be a sample from the population of
items they are intended to represent.) Although the complexity of the negotiations
required to choose items precludes the use of any standard sampling plan for the
items, failure to do so directly effects error estimates.
As an example of the importance of accurate error estimates, Draper’s (1995)
re-analysis of published school achievement rankings in Britain is enlightening.
When appropriate error levels were considered, Draper found, 15% of schools
could be described as “clearly better,” another 15% were “clearly poorer,”
and the remaining 70% were “somewhere in the middle of a large grey area”
(p. 133). Nothing more precise could be justified. The situation is similar
with international studies, a fact that is masked when simple rank orders are
examined. Consequently, many scores close to each other should be considered
“tied.”
The fact that scores may be reported in different ways influences the interpretation of results. If countries are ranked by average score, then the sizes of
differences are masked. Although the difference between fourth and tenth place
is often trivial, this triviality is not evident in the reporting. All the studies
mentioned, except SIMS, may be criticized for this failure, although it is impossible to prevent someone who is determined to produce simplistic rank orders
from doing so.
If results are reported as percentages, then the brevity of many tests is masked
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PHILIP NAGY
and small differences exaggerated. (It is also, somewhat unfortunately, very
convenient for comparisons.) If two countries differ merely by one item on a
25-item test, a difference expressed as “4%” appears large. The 1988 preliminary
report of SISS has received much more publicity than the 1991 and 1992 final
reports, probably because of the former’s relative brevity and longer time of
availability. This preliminary report, however, is based on tests consisting of only
24 and 30 items.
A serious problem in reporting scores concerns the development of scaled
scores using item response theory. Item-response-theory analysis can itself be
controversial, because of its technical complexity (Traub & Wolfe, 1981), and
because the effect of that complexity is to lose the audience (Goldstein, 1993).
Those problems aside, such scaled data appear susceptible to dubious interpretations. In IAEP-1, the data were scaled to a mean of 500 and standard deviation
of 100, resulting in the following (approximate) proportions being imposed on
the data by the shape of the normal curve: below 300, 2%; 300s, 14%; 400s,
34%; 500s, 34% 600s, 14%; and above 600, 2%. Then, characteristics of easy,
medium, and hard items were identified, and were used as labels to describe
achievement at levels 300 through 700.
What’s wrong with this characterization? In IAEP-1 science, these associations
were made:
• 300 — know everyday facts.
• 400 — understand and apply simple scientific principles.
• 500 — use scientific procedures and analyze scientific data.
• 600 — understand and apply intermediate scientific knowledge and principles.
• 700 — integrate scientific information and experimental evidence.
Although these labels suffice as descriptors to distinguish easier from harder
science content, it is not appropriate to define a scale so that, internationally,
precise proportions of students should have their achievement so characterized.
According to Jaeger (1992), a similar attempt at this kind of interpretation for
NAEP was declared a failure by the U.S. General Accounting Office.
Another problem arises if the focus is on elite students, either by examining
a given percentage of high achievers (SISS) or by setting a definition of
“excellent,” and comparing the numbers of students reaching this level (SIMS).
Arising from nothing more than the shape of the normal curve, this type of
comparison greatly exaggerates differences; the higher the standard, the greater
the exaggeration. Using SISS data, I found that a 5% difference at the mean
translated into a 30%–40% difference in the proportion of students exceeding a
high “standard.” The Economic Council of Canada (1992) reported SIMS results
this way, making Canada’s relative standing look much worse than that of
countries with mean achievement marginally higher than Canada’s.
Although achievement and retention are both important, they should be kept
separate. For example, a quick reading of the SIMS data for 13-year-olds shows
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the U.S.A. doing no better than one impoverished developing country. On closer
reading, virtually all of the U.S. age cohort is in school, compared to only about
one-third for the developing country. A suggested adjustment, to multiply the
achievement by the percentage enrolment, makes the comparison more reasonable, but at the price of confounding enrolment and achievement. This calculation
shows the same “effectiveness” if enrolment increases 10% and achievement
decreases 10%, and it can be misinterpreted to blame schools for failing to teach
those who are not in attendance. Achievement of 65% by 80% of the age group
is not the same as 80% achievement by 65% of the age group.
TO WHAT EXTENT CAN THE RESULTS FOR CANADA BE ACCEPTED?
IAEP-1
This study is seriously flawed and has been heavily criticized. The authors used
U.S. items, arbitrary subtest weighting, and no OTL data. The results should be
ignored.
IAEP-2
This study, an improvement over IAEP-1, involved 15 countries (3 of them
limited to only one language group) and 2 more geographically smaller units.
There are four data sets, mathematics and science for 9- and 13-year-olds. The
OTL data are weak, being derived from accounts of school administrators who
reported school emphasis in very broad categories (e.g., “plants,” “animals”).
There are, however, some interesting classroom, home, and individual data. In
three of four comparisons, Canada is tied with most countries, and ahead of one
or two. The exception is mathematics for 9-year-olds, in which Canada did better, coming ahead of six countries. Canada is behind Korea in all four achievement comparisons, behind Taiwan in three of four, and behind Hungary in one.
SISS — Elementary
Although the SISS study, involving 23 countries, is much better than either IAEP
study, it is hampered by OTL data based on vague descriptions of curriculum
content. For age 10, the OTL data indicate great international variability in
curricula; this variability is less at age 14. Assessment of the findings is hampered by the existence of several different reports, reflecting Canada’s language
and jurisdictional problems, and also a preliminary and final report. The original
reports have engaged too much in horse-race comparisons, despite their authors’
warnings.
English Canada, excluding English Quebec, is behind three countries (Korea,
Finland, Japan) at age 10, tied with two, and ahead of most. At age 14, the same
408
PHILIP NAGY
Canadian group is behind Hungary, Japan, and the Netherlands, tied with five or
six countries, and ahead of a similar number. English Quebec (Connelly,
Crocker, & Kass, 1987) is about 5% below the national average at age 10, and
2% above at age 14. Results for French Canada are 4%–5% lower than for
English Canada.
SISS — End of High School
This study is hampered by a somewhat small number of items. OTL data are
uniformly quite high (that reported for chemistry in Canada is an error). I have
excluded the French Canadian results, because the sample is largely Quebec
Grade 11, whereas the English sample is two-thirds Grade 12 and one-third
Ontario Grade 13. Vastly differing proportions of students take the subjects:
• Biology (see Figure 1): proportions of students enrolled are much higher for
Canada than for all countries except Finland. Canadian achievement is in the
lower third of countries. It is as high as in Australia, Sweden, and Japan, who
have two-thirds the enrolment. Four countries perform about 30% better with
one-quarter the enrolment; and four others perform 20% better with one-third
the enrolment.
• Chemistry: no other country has even two-thirds the enrolment of Canada.
Three countries perform roughly 30%–40% better with one-third the
enrolment and about seven more perform 20%–30% better with one-sixth to
two-thirds Canada’s enrolment. Five countries perform no better, even with
far lower proportional enrolment.
• Physics: Canada is second to Norway and tied with Italy in enrolment. One
cluster of five countries with about half Canada’s enrolment performs 25%
better, and a second cluster with about two-thirds the enrolment performs 15%
better. Hong Kong does about 50% better with about half Canada’s enrolment.
Data exist for high-achieving constant proportions of students, taught in
circumstances of greatly varying class homogeneity. But the analysis of that data
exaggerates differences, and the estimate of error cannot be calculated.
• Biology: for the top 3% of the age group, English Canada is in a middle
cluster of most countries, with three somewhat ahead, and three behind.
• Chemistry: for the top 5% of the age group, differences across countries are
very large. Canada is very nearly in the middle, with only five countries close.
England, Japan, and Hong Kong are well ahead, and Norway, Finland, and
Korea well behind.
• Physics: for the top 4% of the age group, Canada’s placement is similar to its
placement in chemistry: Japan and Hong Kong are well ahead, whereas Italy,
Finland, and Hungary are well behind. The rest (nine countries) cluster in the
middle.
409
SIMS
The SIMS study appears to be the best of the set discussed: it reports by subscales, has better OTL data, and includes a large number of items. There are
results for 13-year-olds, and end-of-high-school. Canada is represented by British
Columbia and Ontario only, reported separately. Reporting is by subtest, with
OTL reported on the same graph as achievement. For the younger group, a summary in standard scores (Robitaille & Garden, 1989, p. 124) allows some comparisons without subtest detail. For example, for the 13-year-olds, Ontario had
its best performance in arithmetic and poorest in algebra, whereas B.C. had its
best performance in arithmetic, and poorest in geometry and measurement (a tie).
Relative to 18 other jurisdictions, and arbitrarily giving equal weight to the
subtests in my calculations, Ontario (Grade 13) was behind 7 countries and ahead
of 7, whereas B.C. (Grade 12) was behind 4 and ahead of 13. Ontario tested
Grade 12 students on most subtests used in the main SIMS project, but the
Ontario results appeared in a separate study (McLean, Raphael, & Wahlstrom,
1984). On average, Ontario Grade 12 students did 15% poorer than B.C. Grade
12 students. In the main SIMS project, Japan, the Netherlands, and Hungary were
the leaders. OTL differences largely parallelled the achievement differences.
For the older group, the most significant factor is the proportion of the age
group in school and taking mathematics (see Figure 2). Retention and enrolment
play dominant roles in achievement. For example, Hungary, which does very
well at the younger level, has the lowest achievement of all jurisdictions at
end-of-high-school because of its huge enrolment of the age group. No other
jurisdiction comes close to Hungary’s 50% — B.C. is next highest, at 30% — of
the age cohort taking mathematics.
When equal weight is given to subtests, Ontario Grade 13 achievement is
between that of two countries with similar enrolment, Scotland and Finland, near
the middle of a group of six countries with about two-thirds Ontario’s enrolment,
considerably better than the U.S.A. and considerably poorer than Japan. Of the
three remaining countries, with about one-third Ontario’s enrolment, Ontario does
more poorly than two, and slightly better than one. B.C. has the second-lowest
achievement and second-highest enrolment.
SIMS also examines the achievement of the top students in constant proportions, but with differing levels of elitism in their classrooms. These results, for
the top 5%, are given for three of the six subtests:
• Algebra: B.C. and Ontario are tied with two other jurisdictions, slightly behind
Japan, and ahead of the others;
• Geometry: B.C. and Ontario are tied with five other jurisdictions, slightly
behind Japan, and ahead of the others;
• Elementary Functions and Calculus: Ontario is tied with five countries,
slightly behind Japan, and ahead of the rest; B.C. scored at the chance level,
did three other countries, because calculus is not taught in that province.
410
PHILIP NAGY
411
In summary, results for Canada (in one case, only two provinces) for elementary age groups are fairly consistent: well in the top half or third of the
countries, and usually behind two or three leaders. At end-of-high-school, interpretation is complicated by very large differences in enrolment and retention.
Canada has enrolments among the highest in the world, and correspondingly
lower achievement. When smaller high-achieving groups are isolated, the Canadian high school relative results appear to be fairly similar to those for elementary school, despite the fact that Canada’s heterogeneous high school classes
are being compared to more homogeneous groupings in other countries.
IMMEDIATE PROSPECTS
Further research is clearly needed on Canadian results in international tests. I
suspect that individual and class-level socio-economic data would go a long way
to explaining within-Canada variations. No variable in the control of the school
system has ever been shown to be as powerful a determinant of educational
achievement as student background variables.
The OTL data in international studies are as compelling as the achievement
results. Although vastly different OTLs make achievement comparisons questionable, the data also prompt questions about the quality of the school curriculum.
When one country gives high OTL to twice as many items as another country,
it must raise the question of whether that second country has in place a defensible curriculum. On the other hand, if more mathematics or science are included
in a curriculum, other subjects may suffer. To get more science or mathematics
into the curriculum will require time, money, and the willingness to take something else out.
Canadian participation in international testing will undoubtedly persist. Given
current public concern about education, it would be politically foolish to withdraw from such tests. Over the last few decades substantial progress has been
made in both the design of international tests and the methods analyzing them
(Burstein, 1993a; Goldstein, 1987; Schmidt & Valverde, 1995; Wolfe, 1989). If
all countries work with the same broad set of variables, similar countries can
learn from each other’s within-country analyses: examining the same variables,
learning from each other’s mistakes, and avoiding costly dead-ends.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The original report on which this article is based was written for the 1993–1994 Ontario Royal
Commission on Learning. I thank Xiaofang Shen for assistance in the preparation of the original
report, and Les McLean, Howard Russell, Alan Ryan, and Ross Traub for detailed comments on
earlier versions of the article.
NOTES
1
Elley’s (1992) study was of reading, but the point stands for mathematics and science.
412
PHILIP NAGY
2
Canadians may wish to debate the advisability of such schools in Canada, but that is a separate
question from the comparability of achievement results.
3
These data come from the preliminary report of SISS, published before the study of French
Canada was completed.
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Des objectifs aux compétences: implications pour
l’évaluation de la formation initiale des maîtres
Roland Louis
France Jutras
Hélène Hensler
université de sherbrooke
La mise en application graduelle des nouveaux programmes de formation des maîtres axés
sur le développement de compétences professionnelles exige de revoir certaines conceptions de l’apprentissage à l’enseignement et la nature même de l’évaluation s’y rapportant.
Passer de programmes axés principalement sur des contenus disciplinaires à des programmes visant l’intégration de savoirs, de savoir-faire et d’attitudes nécessaires à l’accomplissement de tâches et de rôles professionnels conduit à une vision différente de l’évaluation. Aussi importe-t-il d’examiner des pistes et de nouveaux modèles d’évaluation de la
compétence des futurs maîtres. Après avoir fait ressortir la distinction entre un programme
axé sur des contenus disciplinaires et un programme basé sur le développement des
compétences professionnelles, nous suggérons une nouvelle orientation de la démarche
d’évaluation et nous dégageons quelques implications associées au développement d’une
instrumentation nécessaire à cette nouvelle démarche d’évaluation.
The gradual implementation of new teacher-training programs geared to the development
of professional competencies requires us to re-examine certain notions about how teachers
learn to teach, and the character of evaluation stemming from those notions. Moving from
programs that are principally discipline-based to those oriented towards the integration of
knowledge, skills, and the attitudes needed for carrying out professional tasks and roles
leads to a different view of evaluation. It is important, therefore, to examine the
possibilities and some new models for evaluating the competence of future teachers.
Having clarified the difference between a discipline-based program and one dedicated to
the development of professional competencies, we suggest a new orientation for the
evaluation process and draw out some implications of the development of an instrument
necessary for this new approach.
INTRODUCTION
Après avoir connu un engouement pour les programmes de formation basés sur
des objectifs reliés à des contenus disciplinaires, les milieux d’éducation du
Québec affichent désormais leur préférence pour des programmes axés principalement sur les compétences. Avant que ce nouveau terme compétence ne
devienne éventuellement un simple substitut à celui d’objectif, nous cherchons
à saisir la portée du changement proposé et à examiner plus particulièrement les
414
21, 4 (1996): 414–432
DES OBJECTIFS AUX COMPÉTENCES
415
implications de cette conception sur l’évaluation dans la formation initiale des
enseignants.
Pour comprendre les implications d’un programme de formation initiale à
l’enseignement défini en termes de compétences plutôt que sous forme d’objectifs d’apprentissage, nous examinerons d’abord sommairement certains aspects
du contexte sociopolitique qui ont contribué à ce changement d’orientation.
Ensuite, nous passerons en revue différentes définitions du concept de compétence pour en retenir une à partir de laquelle nous tenterons de dégager les
orientations qui en découlent pour la refonte des programmes de formation
initiale des enseignants. Enfin, nous aborderons différentes questions reliées à
l’évaluation des étudiantes et des étudiants dans le contexte de tels programmes
de formation professionnelle confiés aux universités.
LE RENOUVELLEMENT DE LA FORMATION PROFESSIONNELLE DU PERSONNEL
ENSEIGNANT
L’institution scolaire fait actuellement face à diverses critiques et pressions
l’incitant à changer ses pratiques, principalement en vue d’une meilleure adaptation aux exigences d’une économie en profonde mutation. Les parents, les
contribuables, les gestionnaires du secteur privé, les médias, la société en général
questionnent et cherchent à influencer le gouvernement pour que les écoles
mettent davantage l’accent sur la rentabilité du système. Et, par ailleurs, au sein
même des milieux éducatifs, peuvent être observées les tendances suivantes:
1. La pression des milieux de pratique sur la formation des maîtres — pression
qui provient d’une perception d’écarts entre la formation universitaire des
maîtres et les attentes du milieu de pratique. Van der Maren (1993) note, à
cet égard, un “discrédit mutuel” dont souffrent les savoirs véhiculés par les
spécialistes des sciences de l’éducation et les savoirs pratiques des enseignants.
2. La volonté d’une professionnalisation de la fonction enseignante — volonté
qui affirme que l’enseignement possède un caractère aussi complexe que
celui des professions officiellement reconnues par le Code des professions
et qui veut rapprocher la formation des maîtres de celle de ces professions
(Goodlad, 1993).
3. Le mouvement nord-américain vers une plus grande imputabilité des milieux
d’enseignement — mouvement qui vise à rechercher l’efficacité et l’efficience
des investissements (ressources humaines et financières) consentis pour
l’éducation des jeunes (Carbonneau, 1993).
Si le mouvement d’imputabilité imprime aux institutions d’éducation le besoin
de faire différemment les choses, la volonté de trouver une certaine harmonie entre les savoirs théoriques et les savoirs pratiques, la préoccupation de rapprocher
la formation des enseignants de celle des professions officiellement reconnues
vont apporter une signification particulière au concept de compétence.
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ROLAND LOUIS, FRANCE JUTRAS ET HÉLÈNE HENSLER
LE CONCEPT DE COMPÉTENCE
Dans le domaine de la formation, la notion de compétence est utilisée autant
comme référence à un construit théorique que pour exprimer un jugement.
La compétence comme construit théorique
Les spécialistes de programmes de formation et les responsables de la formation
dans les institutions d’éducation emploient généralement le terme de compétence
au sens de construit théorique, c’est-à-dire comme un modèle conceptuel imaginé
pour expliquer certains phénomènes. Lorsqu’on parle, par exemple, d’un ensemble de compétences attendues ou de compétences psychopédagogiques, on fait
référence à la notion de compétence comme construit, bien que la définition
même du terme puisse varier d’un auteur à un autre et selon les contextes
d’utilisation (Bunda et Sanders, 1979; Ropé et Tanguy, 1994; Short, 1985). Il
reste que lorsqu’on envisage la compétence comme un construit à partir duquel
on élabore un programme de formation, on postule implicitement que la compétence peut faire l’objet d’un enseignement. Soulignons toutefois que certains
auteurs, comme Jedliczka et Delahaye (1994) croient que les institutions de
formation ne peuvent que développer les capacités les plus susceptibles de faire
émerger la compétence professionnelle puisque celle-ci se modifie constamment.
Qu’est-ce donc que la compétence? Le langage courant comme le langage
spécialisé relient bien souvent l’idée de compétence à celle de connaissance qui
conduit à l’action. Aussi, le Conseil supérieur de l’éducation (1991) présente la
compétence comme un ensemble d’habiletés qui permettent d’agir de manière
cohérente et adaptée à différentes situations dans un domaine d’intervention. Le
Centre d’Études Pédagogiques pour l’Expérimentation et le Conseil (CEPEC)
(Gillet, 1992), par ailleurs, la voit comme un système intériorisé et organisé de
connaissances conceptuelles et procédurales se manifestant par des actions efficaces. Dans le même ordre d’idées, Beauchesne et al. (1993) précisent qu’elle
est composée d’un ensemble de savoirs, de savoir-faire et d’attitudes qui peuvent
être mobilisés et traduits en performances. Pour ces auteurs, la compétence
débouche sur la réalisation de tâches complexes, de manière satisfaisante. Elle
représente donc la capacité d’adaptation de l’individu à une variété de situations
professionnelles. D’autres auteurs, par contre, considèrent que la compétence peut
être prise comme un synonyme d’objectif pédagogique, ce qui, selon le National
Council on Measurement in Education (Bunda et Sanders, 1979), restreint grandement la portée de ce concept. On retrouve surtout cette équivalence dans
certains écrits publiés au cours des années 1970 et inspirés d’une perspective
behavioriste (Andersen, De Vault et Dickson, 1973; Hall et Jones, 1976; Houston
et Hawsan, 1972; Neill, 1978; Schmeider, 1973). Pour sa part, Cardinet (1982),
sans établir une équivalence entre les concepts d’objectif et de compétence, re-
417
connaît qu’ils sont reliés. Selon lui, la notion de compétence servirait à désigner
une catégorie d’objectifs particuliers, soit les objectifs de fonctionnement vus
sous leur forme statique et finale. Il précise que dans ce contexte, la compétence
est définie par l’analyse des rôles et des tâches de la personne en fin de formation (p. 2).
Quant au sens de la notion de compétence véhiculé dans les documents
officiels concernant la réforme de l’enseignement collégial au Québec (Gouvernement du Québec, 1988, 1993; Lemieux, Mercure et Paquette, 1994), il est luimême passablement ambigu, comme en témoignent les nombreux débats autour
de l’approche par compétences publiés dans la revue Pédagogie collégiale. Ainsi,
par exemple, dans le domaine de l’enseignement professionnel, la perspective
adoptée dans l’élaboration des programmes est largement tributaire du courant
behavioriste des années 1970. Selon cette perspective, les compétences seraient
des points d’arrivée externes à l’individu, prédéfinis et qui orientent l’enseignement. Ces points d’arrivées constituent le profil de sortie et sont représentés sous
forme de “comportements reliés à des fonctions de travail spécifiques” (Goulet,
1994a, p. 55). Pour ce qui a trait à l’enseignement général au collégial, la situation semble beaucoup plus confuse. La tentative d’adopter pour l’enseignement
général la même perspective que pour l’enseignement professionnel a soulevé de
vives controverses et a mis en évidence la nécessité d’une clarification conceptuelle des fondements de l’approche par compétences (voir notamment Aylwin,
1994; Goulet, 1994a, 1994b; Tremblay, 1990, 1994, 1995). Plusieurs auteurs ont
clairement souligné la nécessité de faire reposer les nouveaux programmes et leur
implantation sur une vision cognitiviste des compétences et ont proposé des
définitions qui évoquent des savoir-faire complexes (Barbès, 1990; Désilets et
Brassard, 1994; Goulet, 1995; Perrenoud, 1995). Selon la perspective cognitiviste, la compétence est un état, une capacité à agir et non une action particulière.
Cet état est lié à une structure de connaissances conceptuelles et méthodologiques
ainsi qu’à des attitudes et à des valeurs qui permettent à la personne de porter
des jugements et des gestes adaptés à des situations complexes et variées.
La compétence comme jugement
Par ailleurs, la notion de compétence est aussi utilisée, implicitement et souvent
explicitement, au sens d’un standard de performance, d’un standard de réalisation. Dans cette situation, dire d’une personne qu’elle est compétente devient
alors un jugement global porté sur elle à partir de standards reconnus par le
milieu dans lequel elle exerce ou aura à exercer une activité donnée. Par exemple, quand on déclare qu’un enseignant est compétent ou incompétent, qu’un
professeur d’université est compétent dans son domaine, on utilise le terme de
compétence comme un attribut de la personne à partir d’un jugement fondé sur
des standards de performance plus ou moins explicites. Il en est de même
418
lorsqu’on délivre le brevet d’enseignement à un nouvel enseignant: il est à ce
moment qualifié légalement de compétent pour enseigner. C’est donc dans ce
contexte d’utilisation que l’on retrouve généralement une certaine équivalence
entre compétence et capacité, à tout le moins dans leur acception légale. C’est
dans ce contexte également que se situent les écrits se rapportant à ce qu’on
appelle la compétence minimale (minimum competency). Celle-ci, particulièrement utilisée dans les milieux d’éducation primaire et secondaire, se caractérise,
selon Perkins (1982), par la présence explicite de standards de performance
minimale acceptables et par l’utilisation de tests élaborés à cet effet pour prendre
des décisions de certification, de promotion ou de récupération en rapport avec
chaque élève en particulier.
La compétence professionnelle à l’enseignement
Puisque nous nous intéressons à la formation initiale des enseignants et enseignantes, nous envisageons la compétence dans le sens d’un construit théorique
et la définition que nous retenons reflète ce choix. Notre préoccupation se limite
donc à la compétence professionnelle propre à l’enseignement, profession qui
s’exerce dans un contexte de pratique sociale.
Nous revenons donc à une définition de la compétence comme capacité qu’a
l’individu d’accomplir des tâches complexes que l’on rencontre généralement
dans l’exercice d’un métier, d’un art ou d’une profession (Legendre, 1993). En
d’autres termes, la compétence s’observe par l’utilisation efficace des savoirs, des
savoir-faire et des savoir-être pour l’accomplissement des tâches professionelles.
Comme nous l’avons souligné, notre définition se limite à la compétence professionnelle reliée à l’exercice de la fonction enseignante. Nous reconnaissons
d’emblée que la compétence est variable selon le secteur professionnel et selon
les contextes de l’exercice de la profession. Nous reconnaissons aussi que la
compétence professionnelle prend sa source dans les attentes des milieux de pratiques professionnelles et que le rôle des institutions de formation est d’identifier
et de développer les savoirs, les savoir-faire et les savoir-être qui concourent à
l’émergence des capacités qui constituent la compétence professionnelle.
La définition des compétences que nous avons adoptée comporte deux conséquences majeures pour la formation professionnelle des enseignants: elle
nécessite
1. une intégration des savoirs disciplinaires, des savoir-faire et des attitudes. En
cela, la formation doit dépasser l’acquisition des savoirs per se pour favoriser
le développement des savoirs intégrés susceptibles de faire émerger les
compétences spécifiques;
2. l’établissement d’un partenariat avec les milieux de pratique pour négocier,
entre autres, les ajustements entre les savoirs théoriques et les savoirs issus
de la pratique, les modalités d’observation et d’évaluation des compétences
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spécifiques. Cette négociation permettra une meilleure harmonisation entre
ces deux types de savoir et une évaluation de la formation qui cerne mieux
la compétence professionnelle, puisque celle-ci ne s’observe qu’en situation
qui se rapproche le plus de l’exercice de la profession.
En résumé, la compétence professionnelle à l’enseignement, au sens où nous
l’envisageons, posséderait les caractéristiques suivantes: (1) elle est interne à la
personne; (2) elle intègre des savoirs, des savoir-faire et des attitudes; (3) elle se
manifeste dans des situations réelles de pratique d’enseignement à partir des
attentes et de la demande d’un contexte de pratique donné; et (4) une non
manifestation de la compétence n’est pas nécessairement signe de son absence
chez la personne concernée, mais plutôt signe que le contexte, pour diverses
raisons, ne rend pas possible sa mise en oeuvre.
DIFFÉRENCES ENTRE UN PROGRAMME AXÉ SUR LES OBJECTIFS ET UN PROGRAMME
PAR COMPÉTENCE
Les programmes de formation des maîtres visent généralement un ensemble assez
vaste de connaissances, d’habiletés et de développement social que l’étudiant doit
acquérir pour un meilleur fonctionnement dans les milieux de pratique professionnelle. Cette visée, jusqu’ici, était véhiculée dans des contenus disciplinaires
découpés et détaillés sous forme d’objectifs pédagogiques; un objectif pédagogique étant un énoncé d’intention qui précise et fixe les changements durables
qui doivent s’opérer chez le sujet pendant ou suite à une situation pédagogique
(Legendre, 1993). Les objectifs sont donc définis pour chaque contenu disciplinaire et précisent les apprentissages attendus de l’étudiant. Malgré la diversité et
la spécificité des contenus qui composent son parcours de formation, on postule
que l’étudiante ou l’étudiant qui réussit tous ses cours est capable de faire
l’intégration des contenus des cours et est susceptible de: (1) transférer les
connaissances acquises à travers ces contenus dans le contexte de la pratique, et
(2) résoudre des problèmes rencontrés dans la pratique courante à la lumière des
savoirs théoriques découlant de l’intégration des contenus disciplinaires.
Reliés à une approche centrée sur le contenu disciplinaire externe à l’individu,
les objectifs sont généralement spécifiques au contenu de la matière et l’acquisition des connaissances ainsi que le développement des habiletés se font, en
principe, de façon séquentielle. Certains auteurs dont Newmann (1988) soulignent
que cette approche entraîne chez les formateurs une préoccupation de couvrir le
contenu disciplinaire à enseigner et une tendance à fragmenter l’apprentissage des
étudiants. De plus, l’aspect cognitif (savoirs, savoir-faire) prend plus d’importance que l’aspect affectif (savoir-être). En conséquence, l’évaluation s’intéressera généralement aux objectifs d’ordre cognitif reliés à la discipline. Il s’agit de
ce que nous pouvons appeler une évaluation centrée sur le contenu disciplinaire.
D’inspiration behavioriste, un objectif pédagogique: (1) est externe à la personne
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en formation; (2) est prédéfini et fixe; (3) parcellarise le contenu de formation
et postule que la somme des parties est égale au tout; (4) distingue généralement
la formation selon les domaines cognitif (habiletés intellectuelles), affectif
(attitudes) et psychomoteur (habiletés psychomotrices); et (5) considère généralement que la non-atteinte d’un objectif est un indicateur de l’absence, chez
l’individu, de l’apprentissage prévu.
Sans nier les apports considérables de l’approche par objectifs qui a permis
de donner plus de cohérence aux systèmes d’enseignement, il faut reconnaître
que, dans sa mise en oeuvre, c’est la perspective behavioriste qui a dominé. La
logique qui semble guider l’élaboration d’un programme axé sur le développement des compétences nous apparaît différente. Ce sont les compétences attendues par les milieux de pratique professionnelle et les contraintes influençant leur
expression qui constitueront le point de départ et l’aboutissement des activités de
formation. Il nous apparaît qu’un programme axé sur les compétences professionnelles exige au départ:
1. une analyse des rôles et des fonctions que les professionnels d’un secteur
d’activité donné doivent exercer maintenant et dans le futur. Cette analyse
doit prendre en considération les caractéristiques des clientèles, la diversité
des contextes dans lesquels ces rôles et fonctions sont susceptibles d’être
exercés, les attitudes professionnelles et personnelles qui caractérisent
l’exercice de la profession;
2. une adaptation des contenus disciplinaires afin de cerner et de retenir les
aspects qui contribuent directement à l’expression des rôles et fonctions
nécessaires à l’accomplissement des tâches professionnelles. Ici, l’intégration
des contenus disciplinaires n’est plus un objet d’apprentissage dont la
responsabilité incombe exclusivement à l’étudiant. Elle devient avant tout
une opération qui est prise en compte lors même de l’élaboration du programme de formation.
Depuis bien des décennies, les programmes universitaires, pour la plupart,
dispensent une formation axée davantage sur les contenus et les objectifs qui en
découlent que sur le développement de compétences professionnelles. La structure de gestion des programmes de formation, le système de promotion par
crédits ainsi que la définition de la tâche des professeurs d’université renforcent
cette tendance (Hensler et Beauchesne, 1989). La tradition universitaire, par
exemple, impose un découpage des contenus selon les champs de spécialisation
des professeurs. Un tel découpage s’accorde mal avec la construction progressive
des compétences professionnelles, laquelle suppose une subordination et une
intégration des contenus disciplinaires aux nécessités du développement des
compétences professionnelles. De plus, l’expérience accumulée dans le cadre des
programmes axés sur les objectifs d’apprentissage et particulièrement la façon
dont l’évaluation des apprentissages y est envisagée jouent sûrement en faveur
d’une équivalence, voire d’une certaine confusion ou d’une certaine superposition
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entre la logique qui sous-tend un programme axé sur le développement des
compétences et la logique d’inspiration behavioriste qui oriente un programme
basé sur des objectifs. Selon Parisot (1992), par exemple, les objectifs opérationnels doivent être intégrés à une perspective de développement d’une capacité
ou d’une compétence. Cet auteur souligne que “plusieurs compétences peuvent
être proposées comme objectifs à long terme d’un plan de formation” (p. 38).
Cela nous amène à vérifier et à rechercher la distinction entre objectif pédagogique et compétence.
OBJECTIF ET COMPÉTENCE DANS LA PERSPECTIVE DE L’ÉVALUATION
Quand notre préoccupation porte sur le contenu disciplinaire, il est coutume
d’identifier ce que l’étudiant ou l’étudiante doit connaître et être capable de faire
pour répondre aux exigences de la maîtrise du contenu. C’est ainsi qu’on recourt
généralement à la définition d’un ensemble d’objectifs dits pédagogiques parce
que axés sur l’apprentissage attendu chez la personne en formation. Dans une
telle optique, la connaissance résulte d’une accumulation d’habiletés spécifiques
(les objectifs) hiérarchisées selon les exigences du contenu disciplinaire ou du
domaine de pratique. Comme le soulignent Delandshere et Petrosky (1994), la
connaissance est alors considérée comme une “collection of discrete instances of
truths or information, identified categorically in subjects or fields that are
assumed to be historically linear, progressive, and additive” (p. 11). L’approche
évaluative qui découle de ce paradigme portera sur la quantification des savoirs
appris par les personnes en formation. L’évaluation des apprentissages consiste
donc à vérifier l’atteinte, par la personne en formation, des objectifs d’apprentissage préalablement définis. Les instruments de mesure (examens, travaux,
exercices) sont préparés de telle sorte que la somme des bonnes réponses ou le
nombre d’objectifs réussis représentent la meilleure indication de la maîtrise du
contenu de formation. Ainsi, l’unidimensionnalité recherchée (l’explication d’un
phénomène complexe par un facteur) est respectée, en d’autres termes, le score
final observé pour un étudiant renseigne suffisamment sur le degré de maîtrise
du contenu du cours.
Déjà, Popham (1974) avec le concept d’objectifs amplifiés et Hively (1974)
avec celui de mesure reliée à un domaine, ont proposé ces approches pour
remédier aux critiques formulées à l’égard des programmes de formation axés
sur des objectifs opérationnels. C’est pourquoi on a pu observer au cours des
années 1980, au Québec, une tendance à recourir à des objectifs formulés de
façon plus globale afin de contourner les limites des objectifs opérationnels.
Malgré ces efforts, il n’en demeure pas moins que les objectifs, qu’ils soient
spécifiques ou globaux, restent collés à un contenu disciplinaire. Si, toutefois,
l’intérêt est porté sur d’autres types de contenu, deux possibilités se présentent:
(1) soit une division des objectifs selon qu’il s’agisse d’objectifs d’ordre cognitif,
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d’ordre affectif ou d’ordre psychomoteur et alors, de façon générale, l’évaluation
des apprentissages ne prend en compte que les objectifs cognitifs qui découlent
du contenu disciplinaire; (2) soit des objectifs de formation généralement implicites qui visent “la compétence” à poursuivre des études avancées.
Dans une approche axée sur les compétences, l’attention porte non pas sur un
contenu disciplinaire externe à l’individu, mais sur une intégration par l’individu
des savoirs (savoirs théoriques et pratiques), des savoir-faire et des attitudes
nécessaires à l’accomplissement, de façon satisfaisante, des tâches et rôles professionnels complexes. Nous croyons qu’il est juste de relier une telle approche
au courant constructiviste selon lequel la connaissance se construit par l’interaction de l’individu avec son environnement. L’approche par compétences n’est
cependant pas à l’abri des mêmes dérives que celle de l’approche par objectifs.
On observe ainsi une préoccupation des spécialistes de programmes à découper
les compétences en une hiérarchie prédéterminée d’objectifs pédagogiques. Cette
façon de faire est possiblement une conséquence naturelle de l’influence du
behaviorisme qui a dominé longtemps les pratiques éducatives.
Nous avons souligné que la compétence à l’enseignement est un concept
abstrait; cependant, ce sont ses manifestations en compétences spécifiques qui
peuvent être observées dans la pratique d’une profession. Prenons, par exemple,
une compétence qu’on retrouve dans le programme de formation initiale à
l’enseignement secondaire de l’Université de Sherbrooke, la “compétence à
enseigner une leçon ou une suite de leçons en contexte restreint et sous supervision.” On peut dire que celle-ci est bien une compétence spécifique. Mais, nous
croyons que l’évaluation devra s’intéresser aux compétences spécifiques sans les
décomposer sous forme d’objectifs pédagogiques. Car, pour nous comme pour
Wodistsch (1977), une compétence spécifique est un ensemble d’habiletés génériques qui semblent revenir de façon fréquente et récurrente comme composante
de la réussite d’une série de tâches variées impliquant un ensemble de savoirs,
de savoir-faire et d’attitudes. Par définition, un individu possède une compétence
spécifique lorsqu’il réussit, à travers une variété de situations et de contextes, un
groupe d’activités considérées comme ses indicateurs. Cette considération nous
conduit vers une vision multidimensionnelle de l’évaluation des compétences,
contrairement à la formation par objectifs de performance qui commande une
approche unidimensionnelle.
Par ailleurs, une autre caractéristique distingue un objectif d’une compétence.
Si l’objectif dérive généralement et de façon directe d’un savoir théorique issu
d’un contenu disciplinaire, la compétence, quant à elle, prend pour source les
tâches complexes et pratiques nécessaires à l’accomplissement d’un rôle ou d’une
fonction. Bien sûr, le contenu notionnel disciplinaire y est encore présent.
Cependant, celui-ci ne représente qu’une catégorie de ressources parmi d’autres
nécessaires à l’accomplissement d’une tâche donnée. En d’autres termes, si
l’accomplissement d’une tâche nécessite un savoir disciplinaire donné, la maîtrise
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de ce dernier n’est pas nécessairement l’indicateur de la capacité d’accomplir la
tâche. L’évaluation des apprentissages dans une formation axée sur les compétences va donc s’intéresser à l’accomplissement d’une variété de tâches qui
permettent d’inférer la compétence professionnelle. L’instrumentation nécessaire
à l’évaluation des compétences portera alors sur des tâches évaluatives qui se
rapprochent le plus de la situation réelle de l’exercice de la profession pour
laquelle la personne est préparée. Puisque la compétence professionnelle est
formée d’une série de compétences spécifiques variées qui, à leur tour, traduisent
cette multidimensionnalité, les tâches évaluatives auront à cerner les profils
indicateurs de la complexité de la compétence professionnelle. Ces profils
permettront alors de mieux rendre les décisions sur la présence ou l’absence,
chez la personne formée, de la compétence professionnelle en question.
Jusqu’ici nous avons démontré qu’un programme axé sur les compétences
comporte des fondements différents d’un programme axé sur des objectifs
pédagogiques. Nous avons laissé entrevoir que l’évaluation de la formation des
étudiantes et étudiants dans un programme axé sur les compétences devra être
cohérente avec l’orientation du programme. Il nous intéresse maintenant d’examiner les implications de cette orientation sur les pratiques évaluatives.
L’ÉVALUATION DANS UNE LOGIQUE DE DÉVELOPPEMENT DES COMPÉTENCES
PROFESSIONNELLES
Dans un programme orienté vers l’acquisition par les étudiantes et étudiants des
compétences nécessaires à l’exercice d’une profession, il devient évident que la
certification de cette formation doit porter sur les compétences professionnelles
attendues.
Avant d’envisager toute méthode d’évaluation des compétences, nous devons
rappeler les considérations suivantes:
1. La compétence, dans le sens le plus large du terme, comme l’apprentissage
d’ailleurs, est un attribut du développement de la personne. Par conséquent,
elle est affaire de toute une vie. Cela n’empêche pas que nous puissions nous
intéresser à sa manifestation dans l’espace et dans le temps. Par exemple, les
documents ministériels portant sur la formation des maîtres (Gouvernement
du Québec, 1992, 1994) définissent et délimitent dans le temps les compétences attendues, tout en reconnaissant aux universités le droit de fixer des
seuils réalistes: quatre années sont accordées au futur maître pour les développer. De plus, il revient aux responsables de la formation de délimiter
l’espace que doit occuper chacune des compétences et les étapes de leur
développement. La démarche de l’évaluation ne devrait pas perdre de vue
l’aspect développemental de la compétence tout en tenant compte du processus d’acquisition des compétences et des résultats de celle-ci, comme le
souligne McGachie (1991): “For most professions, evaluation is a sequential
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affair, an activity that occurs at stages of selection for education, during the
process of professional education, and most visibly, when candidates for
certification or licensure submit to evaluation” (p. 4).
2. Nous avons déjà souligné que la compétence professionnelle s’observe à
partir de l’accomplissement satisfaisant d’une variété de tâches et de rôles
professionnels. Il s’agira alors de bien les cerner afin de déterminer les
objets, les moments de l’évaluation et d’assurer sa validité et sa fiabilité.
3. Nous constatons que, malgré la popularité du discours selon lequel l’évaluation doit faire partie intégrante de l’acte d’enseigner et de l’élaboration de
programmes, l’évaluation arrive souvent après coup. Cette situation n’est pas
sans causer des problèmes méthodologiques, des problèmes d’ajustement de
concepts et, souvent, des problèmes de confrontation de visions disciplinaires. En conséquence, en dépit de la nouvelle orientation proposée dans les
programmes de formation, il y a risque de perpétuer les pratiques évaluatives
déjà installées et qui ne sont pas nécessairement congruentes avec la nouvelle
orientation. Il deviendra, par la suite, plus difficile de changer ces pratiques.
4. Rappelons qu’une compétence est, par définition, multidimensionnelle. En
conséquence, il n’est pas souhaitable de la réduire à un trait unidimensionnel.
En d’autres termes, il faut penser à des mesures qui prennent en compte les
dimensions importantes retenues pour évaluer chaque compétence. Une
note de passage n’est plus de mise; il faut recourir à des scores multiples.
La littérature anglo-saxonne rapporte des études sur la mesure des compétences — par exemple, le minimum competency testing (Citron, 1982;
Madaus, 1982; Perkins, 1982) — et sur les approches de fixation des standards de performance (Angoff, 1971; Hambleton, 1980; Jaeger, 1978, 1994;
Plake, 1994). En outre, au congrès de l’American Educational Research
Association (1994), un symposium a porté sur l’actualité du problème et sur
une analyse de trois méthodes différentes de fixation des seuils de performance compte tenu de la complexité des tâches qui permettent d’inférer la
présence de la compétence à enseigner (voir à ce sujet Hambleton et Plake,
1994; Jaeger, 1994).
VERS UN MODÈLE D’ÉVALUATION DES COMPÉTENCES PROFESSIONNELLES À
L’ENSEIGNEMENT
Dans certains secteurs d’activité (pensons au travail social, par exemple), l’admission à l’exercice de la profession repose uniquement sur l’obtention par le
candidat du nombre et de la nature des crédits prévus pour la formation. Dans
d’autres secteurs d’activité, cependant (par exemple la médecine, la comptabilité),
l’évaluation pour fins d’admission à la profession se fait a posteriori par des
organismes autres que l’institution de formation, donc externes au contexte de
la formation. Dans ces cas, un comité formé de spécialistes de la profession
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(théoriciens et praticiens), de consultants en évaluation et de représentants de
l’association professionnelle, détermine les indicateurs mesurables de la compétence attendue, procède à l’élaboration des instruments de mesure appropriés et
fixe le seuil de passage. Le jugement sur la valeur professionnelle est déterminé
par le contenu de l’instrument de mesure et par les exigences adoptées pour le
seuil de passage. L’accès à l’enseignement, au Québec, repose sur un compromis
entre les deux modèles que nous venons de décrire. Pour obtenir son brevet
d’enseignement, le candidat doit compléter le nombre de crédits prévus et être
évalué de façon continue sur une période équivalente à deux ans de stage probatoire. Ces évaluations se font généralement dans les milieux de pratique par un
comité formé d’un enseignant qui agit comme accompagnateur du stagiaire et du
directeur de l’école où le stage probatoire a lieu. Une grille d’observation est
prévue par le Ministère de l’Éducation du Québec (M.É.Q.) pour évaluer le
probaniste et formuler au M.É.Q. les recommandations nécessaires permettant la
délivrance du brevet.1
Ces modèles qui, selon nous, envisagent la compétence comme jugement, ne
semblent plus pertinents dans un contexte où le programme de formation vise,
de façon explicite, le développement de la compétence professionnelle à partir
de l’enseignement d’un ensemble de compétences spécifiques et où la certification des étudiants est assumée par l’institution de formation. Il y a donc lieu de
recourir à un modèle différent où l’évaluation aura à jouer deux rôles importants:
d’une part, certifier de manière adéquate et valide les personnes formées dans le
programme et, d’autre part, informer directement les responsables du programme
sur le développement des compétences en tant qu’objets de formation.
Soulignons que les programmes de formation axée sur le développement des
compétences arrivent, au Québec, au moment où il y a une remise en question
du modèle dominant en évaluation des apprentissages, soit le modèle basé sur les
contenus disciplinaires et sur leur découpage issu d’une conception behavioriste
de l’apprentissage. De nos jours, particulièrement sous l’influence de la psychologie cognitive, l’évaluation semble s’intéresser au développement de la personne
dans un environnement complexe, varié et changeant. Pour Glaser (1994), les
concepts issus de l’approche psychométrique traditionnelle vont faire place, dans
le design de l’évaluation, aux concepts de cognition, d’apprentissage et de
compétence reliés à la psychologie cognitive. Des auteurs tels Wiggins (1993),
Beck (1991) et Shepard (1989) parlent d’évaluation authentique, c’est-à-dire
d’une évaluation qui, dans le cas qui nous intéresse, devrait tenir compte du
contexte et de l’environnement dans lesquels se déroule l’action professionnelle.
Conséquemment, l’évaluation des apprentissages ne reposera plus uniquement sur
un type d’instrumentation mais sur une variété d’instruments permettant de
saisir la complexité des tâches professionnelles. On parle alors de performancebased assessement (Linn, 1994; Millman, 1991; Quellmaz, 1991). Cette préoccupation amène les chercheurs à revoir les concepts de validité, de fidélité et les
approches de définition des domaines de compétences.
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Révision du concept de validité
Dans la pratique courante, bon nombre de spécialistes de l’évaluation croient que
la validité d’un test réfère principalement à la validité de contenu, ce qui signifie
qu’un test est valide si on observe une parfaite adéquation entre le contenu du
test et les apprentissages qu’il entend mesurer. Comme l’a souligné Messick la
validité de contenu et que l’accent est mis sur l’élaboration de l’instrument de
mesure plutôt que sur les résultats obtenus et l’interprétation que l’on en fait.
Nous parlons de validité lorsqu’on procède à la vérification de l’interprétation
que l’on peut faire des données recueillies à la suite de l’application de la démarche d’évaluation (élaboration et administration de l’intrumentation appropriée)
qui a permis d’obtenir ces données. En effet, un test peut bien représenter le
contenu qu’il est censé mesurer et être utilisé dans des situations et des contextes
qui l’invalident. Dans le cas d’une évaluation des compétences, la validité consistera à déterminer dans quelle mesure les données obtenues lors de la situation
d’évaluation seront convergentes par rapport aux compétences nécessaires à
l’exercice efficace de la profession.
La nouvelle vision de l’évaluation fait ressortir l’importance du concept de
validité, particulièrement la validité de construit, donnant au concept de fidélité
une place secondaire (Linn, Baker et Dunbar, 1991; Messick, 1992, 1994). Aussi,
Moss (1995) croit qu’une évaluation qui se base sur l’accomplissement d’une
variété de tâches complexes faisant appel à une intégration des savoirs rend
impossible toute distinction entre validité et fidélité. De plus en plus, les chercheurs associent au concept de validité les conséquences sociales d’une décision
prise à la suite d’une démarche évaluative (Cronbach, 1988; Linn et al., 1991;
Messick, 1989; Moss, 1992) rompant ainsi avec la tradition qui limitait la validité
uniquement à la recherche d’une meilleure interprétation des résulats de l’évaluation. Linn et al. (1991) suggèrent des critères additionnels pour juger de la
validité d’une évaluation axée sur des performances complexes. En plus des
critères de conséquences sociales, nous dégageons ces critères en les adaptant au
contexte de l’évaluation des futurs enseignants:
— l’équité qui réfère à la prise en considération, lors de l’évaluation, de la
diversité culturelle des étudiants et de celle des milieux de pratique dans
lesquels se déroulent leur formation pratique;
— l’authenticité qui devrait caractériser la situation d’évaluation. On croit que
plus l’évaluation tiendra compte du contexte réel de l’exercice de la profession, plus les étudiants seront motivés à démontrer qu’ils possèdent les
compétences évaluées;
— la représentativité du contenu évalué qui, normalement, devrait couvrir
l’ensemble des compétences visées par le programme d’études;
— la qualité du contenu retenu pour l’évaluation qui devrait tenir compte des
attributs critiques de l’enseignement et de leur permanence à travers le
temps;
427
— la complexité cognitive à laquelle les situations d’évaluation devraient faire
appel;
— le transfert et la généralisation des résultats obtenus;
— le rapport coût-efficacité qui devrait être recherché compte tenu des diverses
activités et des différents agents (superviseurs, enseignants-associés, etc.)
nécessaires à l’évaluation des performances complexes.
Pour Linn (1994), cette nouvelle vision de la validité serait bien accueillie par
les tenants d’une évaluation axée sur les performances, eux qui réclamaient un
élargissement de la notion de validité dans le contexte d’une évaluation authentique.
Révision du concept de fidélité
La fidélité, selon la théorie classique des tests, est la propriété selon laquelle
l’interaction entre un ensemble d’objets mesurés et l’instrument de mesure donne
les mêmes résultats lorsqu’elle est observée à plusieurs occasions et dans les
mêmes conditions. En mesurant un ensemble d’objets à plusieurs reprises, on
peut observer une variation dans les résultats obtenus pour les différents objets.
Cette variation porte sur l’objet par rapport à lui-même à plusieurs occasions et
sur les objets les uns par rapport aux autres. La variation observée est alors
analysée selon deux types de variance: (1) la vraie variance — variation due à la
vraie différence entre les objets quant à l’attribut mesuré, et (2) la variance des
erreurs — variation due à l’imperfection de l’instrumentation, aux conditions
d’administration de celle-ci (moments d’administration, nombre d’occasions,
modes d’observation) et aux interprétations possibles des résultats. On postule
alors que les erreurs se manifestent de façon indépendante et aléatoire et qu’elles
s’annulent mathématiquement. La fidélité d’une mesure est alors définie par la
proportion de la variation totale qui provient de la vraie variance, soit:
où rtt=coefficient de fidélité
s2e=variance due aux erreurs
s2t=variance totale (vraie variance + variance due aux erreurs)
Plus la variance des erreurs tend vers zéro, plus la vraie variance tend vers le
maximum. Le coefficient de fidélité traduit alors le niveau de fiabilité avec
lequel on peut interpréter les résultats de l’évaluation.
Si jusqu’ici la recherche de la fidélité d’un instrument de mesure était
considérée comme la démarche la plus importante, l’évaluation axée sur le développement des compétences remet en question cette importance (au profit de la
428
validité de construit, comme souligné plus haut) et le modèle mathématique sur
lequel se base le calcul de la fidélité. Rappelons que dans ce modèle les conditions d’administration font partie des sources d’erreur et qu’il devenait important
de rendre celles-ci le plus uniformes possibles. Or, la diversité des contextes, les
interactions complexes et souvent imprévisibles qui prennent naissance lors de
l’observation des compétences constituent des variables importantes à prendre en
considération dans le modèle de calcul de fidélité.
Révision de la démarche de spécification de domaine
Une autre implication importante d’une évaluation axée sur le développement des
compétences concerne la spécification du domaine des performances qui serviront
d’indicateurs. Jusqu’à maintenant, le domaine que devait couvrir un instrument
de mesure considérait le contenu disciplinaire (souvent les objectifs pédagogiques) ainsi que les éléments de la taxonomie du domaine cognitif et, dans
certains cas, les habiletés reliées à la discipline. Puisque l’intérêt porte maintenant sur les gestes professionnels, la définition du domaine doit prendre en
considération les gestes, les activités, les contextes les plus signifiants qu’exige
l’exercice de la profession (Messick, 1989; Schaefer, Raymond et White, 1992).
Schaefer et al. (1992) soulignent qu’il est clair que beaucoup de soin devra être
apporté à la conceptualisation et à la spécification des domaines de performances
afin de s’assurer de la validité et de l’utilité de l’évaluation. De plus, Millman
(1991) apporte une mise en garde contre les risques que peut entraîner la prise
en compte des contextes lors de la définition du domaine de performances. Pour
ces auteurs, les candidats qui n’ont pas eu d’expérience dans un contexte donné
peuvent être défavorisés par rapport à ceux qui auraient eu une telle expérience.
Dans la mesure où l’on accepte que les tâches professionnelles qu’il convient
d’évaluer sont complexes et peuvent varier d’une situation à une autre, les
réponses attendues devraient aussi varier d’un individu à un autre. En d’autres
termes, il n’y a pas de réponse unique et prédéterminée. L’évaluateur doit utiliser
son jugement pour analyser et interpréter la variété des réponses possibles. C’est
alors qu’il devient nécesaire de définir, dans la démarche de définition du
domaine de performances, en prévision de l’évaluation des futurs enseignants, les
dimensions qui représentent les attributs critiques de l’enseignement et qui
permettent de mieux situer et interpréter les performances des enseignants en
formation (Delandshere et Petrosky, 1994).
Enfin, une autre implication non moins importante concerne le coût relié au
développement et à la mise en application d’une évaluation qui vise le développement des compétences. La variété des instruments (épreuves papier-crayon,
grilles d’observation, portfolio, etc.) permettant de mesurer la complexité des
actions professionnelles, les moyens divers qui doivent supporter toute cette
instrumentation (moyens audio-visuels, examinateurs, correcteurs, etc.), le temps
qu’on doit accorder pour la cueillette des données et la compilation de celles-ci
429
sont autant de facteurs avec lesquels il faut compter. Comme le souligne Millman
(1991), on ne connaît pas encore les coûts reliés à l’évaluation de la compétence
professionnelle dans un contexte de certification. Cependant, on peut se demander si les bénéfices que la profession en retirera vaudront les sommes investies.
Nous avons montré qu’un programme axé sur le développement de la compétence professionnelle à l’enseignement implique une nouvelle orientation dans la
façon de concevoir l’évaluation des apprentissages et, conséquemment, une
révision des pratiques actuelles. En somme, les nouveaux programmes de formation à l’enseignement axés sur le développement des compétences professionnelles ont exigé chez les concepteurs une posture conceptuelle qui diffère de
celle des anciens programmes basés principalement sur des contenus disciplinaires. Dans la mise en oeuvre de cette formation maintenant, un des défis
auxquels nous faisons face concerne la mise en place de dispositifs d’évaluation
des performances complexes, c’est-à-dire des dispositifs valides, fiables, faisables
et capables de nous informer sur le développement des compétences professionnelles à l’enseignement chez les personnes en formation. Nous travaillons
actuellement à l’élaboration d’un modèle qui, dans le contexte des stages, prend
en considération cette nouvelle orientation de l’évaluation. Il nous reste à valider
le modèle et à le soumettre au test de la pratique.
NOTE
1
Après la refonte des différents programmes de formation à l’enseignement au Québec, le ministère
de l’Éducation a décidé de supprimer le stage de probation pour les diplômés des nouveaux
programmes qui débuteront leur carrière d’enseignant. Un brevet d’enseignement sera donc
décerné aux diplômés des programmes actuellement en implantation, au terme de leur formation
initiale. Cependant, il est prévu que les commissions scolaires devront mettre en place des
mesures de soutien à l’insertion professionnelle.
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Gender Equity and Schooling:
Linking Research and Policy
university of western ontario
In Canada over the last 25 years, a variety of approaches to gender equity and schooling
has developed. The history of educational research and policy making on this topic
reveals how the two activities have been linked, primarily through the work of teachers
and their organizations. Although sex-role socialization theory has been most influential
in shaping government policies and pedagogical practices, teachers also have drawn on
a wider body of research to inform their work in schools.
Au cours des 25 dernières années au Canada, diverses approches ont été élaborées en
matière d’égalité des sexes à l’école. L’histoire de la recherche en éducation et de l’établissement des politiques sur ce sujet révèle comment les deux activités sont reliées, surtout
à travers le travail des enseignants et des établissements auxquels ils sont rattachés. Bien
que la théorie de l’apprentissage social des rôles sexuels ait beaucoup influencé l’élaboration des politiques gouvernementales et des pratiques pédagogiques, les enseignants se
fondent sur un corpus de recherche plus vaste pour orienter leur travail à l’école.
Feminist research has had a noticeable effect on education policy makers.1
Although a significant portion of the most important and influential research has
come from the field of women’s studies, feminist scholars in Faculties of Education as well as teacher-researchers2 have also made key contributions. Indeed, the
nature and purpose of feminist research in education, whether it occurs inside or
outside Faculties of Education, is such that no artificial polarity between research
and policy is created; rather, there is a conscious linking of the two — research
informs policy making, and policy successes and failures inform research. At the
same time, some specific types and forms of feminist research have been more
widely influential in the policy arena than have others. The recent history of
research and policy making illustrates both how these two activities are linked,
largely through the efforts of female educators in a variety of roles, and why
some research approaches are more acceptable to and are used more often by
policy makers than are others.
SEX ROLES, STEREOTYPING, AND SCHOOLING
For centuries, access to education has been seen as a central policy initiative in
the struggle for women’s equality. With the resurgence of the women’s
movement in Canada during the late 1960s, education was again identified as a
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REBECCA PRIEGERT COULTER
key policy domain. The Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada
(1970) listed education as one of nine public policy areas “particularly germane
to the status of women” (p. ix). By using the contemporary research on sex-role
socialization, the Commission and many women’s groups argued that sex-role
stereotyping, the lack of strong female role-models for girls, and inadequate
career counselling were key factors contributing to women’s inequality in
Canada. For the best part of the next two decades, this type of analysis, as part
of a larger liberal feminist3 agenda, shaped policy making around women’s
education, and resulted in remarkably similar initiatives across the country.
The earliest initiatives centred on sex-role stereotyping in textbooks. During
the 1970s several research studies were conducted (Ad Hoc Committee Respecting the Status of Women in the North York System, 1975; Batcher, Brackstone,
Winter, & Wright, 1975; Cullen, 1972; Women in Teaching, 1975). They relied
heavily on a quantitative approach to stereotyping and reported how many times
women and men appeared in stories and illustrations, and in what types of roles
in the work force and family. All studies came to the same conclusion. Textbooks were biased. Batcher et al. (1975), for example, concluded from their
review of all the reading series approved for use in Grades 4 to 6 in Ontario
schools, that none could be termed “positive-image” or “non-sexist” (p. i). A
North York study found ample evidence of sexism in the readers used in Grades
1 to 3 as well as “shocking evidence of various other kinds of rigid stereotyping
and of racism” (Ad Hoc Committee, 1975, p. 16). Policy was developed in
response to this research. By 1987 every Canadian province had guidelines for
textbook selection and an evaluation grid designed to eliminate sex bias in
learning materials (Julien, 1987, p. 53).4
Closely tied to the concern for sex-role stereotyping in textbooks was an
emerging assessment of women’s absence from the curriculum in general (Pierson, 1995). Beginning in the 1970s, a range of lesson plans and units was
developed to assist teachers. For example, the British Columbia Teachers’
Federation (BCTF), through its Lesson Aids Service, published a variety of kits
and curriculum packages with titles such as “Women in the Community,”
“Famous Canadian Women,” “Early Canadian Women,” and “From Captivity to
Choice: Native Women in Canadian Literature.” The Ontario Ministry of Education (1977) published a resource guide for teachers called Sex-Role Stereotyping
and Women’s Studies, which included units of study, resource lists, and teaching
suggestions for teachers at all grade levels. In 1977, the British Columbia Department of Education published Women’s Studies: A Resource Guide for Teachers.
At the same time, other government agencies, institutions, and commercial
publishers began producing materials for classroom use. The Ontario Institute for
Studies in Education, for example, compiled The Women’s Kit (1974), a collection of print and audio-visual materials. So began the first stage of curriculum
reform, a clear illustration of what has been called “the add women and stir”
GENDER EQUITY AND SCHOOLING: LINKING RESEARCH AND POLICY
435
model, an approach still prevalent today. Information about women continues to
be added to existing curricula in the form of individual lessons or a special unit.
Education policies also were shaped in response to women’s failure to enrol
in mathematics, sciences, and technology courses, and women’s apparent lack of
interest in non-traditional work in the trades. This area of concern has been
pursued vigorously in the policy domain because it maps onto the discourse
about education for global competitiveness and schooling for the new economic
realities. Again, based on sex-role theory, it was argued that girls lacked effective role models and received inadequate career counselling, and hence were
socialized to consider only a narrow range of occupations. The policy response
to this “problem” has been massive. As Julien (1987) discovered,
The breadth of guidance materials made available by the provinces to female students
concerning career options is enormous. Preparing young women for the new technology,
broadening their career goals to include options that may have seemed unavailable to
them, and introducing non-traditional occupations as career alternatives, are subjects of
a seemingly constant flow of literature. (p. 5)
Across Canada, teacher federations, school boards, ministries of education and
labour/employment, women’s directorates/secretariats, and women’s groups such
as Women Into Scholarship, Engineering, Science and Technology, and the
Women Inventors’ Project developed posters, pamphlets, videotapes, films, and
workshops for girls, urging them to be all that they could be. Role modelling and
mentoring programs, speakers’ bureaus, girls-only career days, and girl-friendly
computer courses were developed. The extent of these types of responses is
illustrated in a 1992 survey of Canadian mathematics and science programs for
girls and women conducted by the Nova Scotia Women’s Directorate. This
survey yielded information about 92 separate programs as well as a conclusion
that there were many more programs not reporting (Armour & Associates, 1992,
p. 5).
Across Canada, the dominant approach to gender-equity policies in education,
and even then implemented unevenly and inconsistently, remains the relatively
shallow one of sex-role stereotyping first articulated in the 1970s. A recent report
from the Maritime Provinces Education Foundation (1991), for example, concluded that in education there was
a) the need to promote a better self-image among female students beginning in the earliest
grades; b) the need to expose female students to a broader range of career options, especially in the field of mathematics, science and technology; and c) the need to recognize
and build on the positive effect that role modelling has on female students. (pp. i–ii)
Ontario’s recent Royal Commission on Learning (1994) identified sex-role
stereotyping, the absence of women in physics, engineering, and technology, and
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the lack of women’s awareness about the range of career opportunities available
as key gender-equity issues (pp. 42–43). These conclusions are no different from
those in the 1970 report of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women.
Why sex-role socialization theory remains dominant in education can in part
be explained by the fact that it is a form of critique easily accommodated within
existing state arrangements and liberal notions of equality of opportunity. It sits
very comfortably with a view of the state as a relatively benign institution, and
one that is inherently fair. Coupled with this explanation is the force of a common understanding of teaching, an understanding shaped overwhelmingly by
educational psychology and its emphasis on the individual. In this context, each
student must be helped to realize his/her full potential and becomes responsible
for his/her individual successes or failures. Each student is seen only as an
individual, outside the social relations of sex, class, ethnicity, race, or sexual
orientation. The gender reform and non-sexist strategies arising from the sex-role
framework emphasize changing individuals and hence present no fundamental
challenge to either the state or the schools.
CHALLENGING SEX-ROLE EXPLANATIONS
Although the forms of policy development and implementation outlined above
are still dominant today, some significant shifts in analysis and action have begun
to develop. By the mid-1980s, a cogent critique of earlier research, and hence of
the policies based on that research, emerged. Feminist scholars began to point out
that many policies and practices of non-sexist education were based on assumptions that girls were “lesser boys” and the goal was to make girls more like boys,
to make women “less defective men.” That is, by adopting a non-sexist approach,
teachers were, in essence, inadvertently reinforcing the notion of women’s
inferiority because girls were being pushed to be like boys or men. As Gaskell,
McLaren, and Novogrodsky (1989) point out, interventions based on sex-role
theory, especially role-modelling programs, “leave unchallenged the gender bias
in schools . . . [and are based] on the assumption that girls must be changed.
Men are the model of achievement, and compared to men, women don’t measure
up” (p. 16). It was also observed that role-modelling programs, self-esteem
workshops, and the like are based on the notion that individual girls must be
helped. These types of programs rarely take account of the very real material
circumstances and barriers young women will face. Even when these programs
acknowledge barriers, the solution is to “empower” each girl to overcome the
obstacles rather than to challenge the obstacles themselves.
The sex-role stereotyping approach also was criticized from the radical or
cultural feminist position for devaluing women’s “special” contributions, namely
nurturing, care, and concern. The work of Noddings (1984), Martin (1985), and,
most influentially, Gilligan (1982) became important in policy debates as some
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women began to demand the revaluing of the feminine and women’s ways of
knowing, caring, and teaching. How this new position intersects with the development of education policy is best seen in the arguments brought forward to
support more women in positions of leadership in education.
Although it had long been obvious that women were underrepresented numerically and proportionally in administrative posts, the argument that women
brought special attributes to leadership, that women were better listeners and
team players, more democratic principals, and often were more effective in
managing change (Shakeshaft, 1989), seems to have been more effective than
simple justice or fairness arguments based on numbers and the concept of equal
rights. What is at work here is women’s use of the “different but equal” strategy.
During the 1980s and early 1990s, female educators lobbied for more women in
educational administration based on the research that suggested women bring
different (and by implication better) perspectives and strengths to leadership tasks
(Joly, McIntyre, Staszenski, & Young, 1992; Tabin & Coleman, 1993). In
Ontario during the 1980s, the Federation of Women Teachers’ Associations of
Ontario (FWTAO) and others lobbying for change tied the radical/cultural
feminist arguments about women’s special abilities to the liberal feminist arguments about the importance of students seeing women in leadership roles in
schools. The eventual success of this lobby led to an amendment to The Education Act in 1988 which allowed the Minister of Education to require school
boards to implement employment-equity programs with respect to the promotion
of women to positions of added responsibility. The Minister of Education
indicated that, as a goal, 50% of the occupational categories of vice-principal,
principal, and supervisory officer should be held by women by the year 2000.
However, since the election of a Progressive Conservative government in Ontario
in 1995, all references to employment equity have been removed from the
statutes, a step the teacher federations regard as a setback. Nonetheless, it
appears that many school boards, having begun the process of examining their
hiring practices and policies, will continue with some form of employment equity
at the local level.
Although research studies (Baudoux, 1995; Gill, 1995; Ontario Ministry of
Education, 1992; Rees, 1990) suggest there is a long way to go in every province
before women are well represented in administration, there is no doubt that
women’s access to leadership positions in schools is a well-established issue and
women are likely to continue to enter into administrative positions with school
boards. By 1990, eight provincial ministries of education and school boards in
six provinces had some form of equal-opportunity, affirmative-action, or employment-equity policy (Rees, 1990, p. 85) designed to improve women’s representation in administrative positions. The prevalence of these policies attests to the
power of female teachers’ political lobbying and the combined influence of
liberal and radical/cultural feminist research that united the discourses of equal
opportunity and women’s “special attributes.”
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The concepts of “a different voice,” “women’s ways of knowing,” and
“women-centred learning” (Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger, & Tarule, 1986) have
had other effects. Responding specifically to the research of Gilligan (1982) and
her colleagues (Brown & Gilligan, 1992; Gilligan, Lyons, & Hanmer, 1990), a
feminist girls’ school, The Linden School, was recently established in Toronto
(Moore & Goudie, 1995). In Edmonton, the Nellie McClung Program provides
an alternative junior high school for girls within the public system (SanfordSmith, 1996). Single-sex mathematics and science classes are being seriously
considered or are already in operation in a number of jurisdictions across Canada
(Conrad, 1996). The practice of women-centred learning is particularly obvious
in specific job training or re-entry programs such as Women Into Trades and
Technology (Gedies, 1994; Pierson, 1995) and in some literacy programs (Lloyd,
1992).
The focus on women’s experiences has led to a number of studies of sexual
harassment and of other forms of violence against female students (Larkin, 1994;
Staton & Larkin, 1992, 1993), and the development and implementation of several projects designed to curb that violence. The Canadian Teachers’ Federation
(CTF) (1990b), for example, published a curriculum document called Thumbs
Down: A Classroom Response to Violence Towards Women and several provincial federations and school boards have also provided materials for the use of
classroom teachers. In Ontario, the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation (OSSTF), the Ontario Women’s Directorate, and the Ontario Ministry of
Education and Training (1995) co-operated in the production of a teaching
resource called The Joke’s Over: Student to Student Sexual Harassment in
Secondary Schools. Staton and Larkin (1996) have produced a resource for
elementary school teachers called Harassment Hurts: Sex-Role Stereotyping and
Sexual Harassment Elementary School Resources.
In a unique study, the CTF (1990a), in co-operation with its provincial affiliates, used teachers to conduct a national, school-based, action research study of
girls which resulted in the publication of A Cappella: A Report on the Realities,
Concerns, Expectations and Barriers Experienced by Adolescent Women in
Canada. As a result of this report, follow-up activities to educate teachers and
youth workers about the problems of adolescent girls, especially concerning
self-esteem, harassment, and violence, have been undertaken (Canadian Teachers’
Federation, 1993a, 1993b). At the same time, and most unfortunately, much
policy currently being developed by ministries of education and teacher federations around the safe schools issue ignores the gendered dimension of violence,
whether that violence is directed towards teachers or students (L. Robertson,
1996). Sexual harassment policies are unevenly developed across Canada and are
non-existent in many locations (Rees, 1990). Where policy exists, it is often
inadequate. As H.-J. Robertson (1993) discovered in her analysis of the assumptions underpinning policy and contract language, there is only “a superficial
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recognition that sexual harassment is the abuse of power in a system in which
power has been distributed by gender” (p. 47) and “a conflicted view of culpability and responsibility in the event of harassment” (p. 46).
Ironically, the revaluing of women’s contributions and experiences has also
led to some small initiatives involving boys’ education. Canadian schools have
long encouraged boys to take home economics or family studies classes and
some provinces make this mandatory. In New Brunswick and Quebec, for
example, industrial arts/introductory technology and home economics courses are
compulsory for both girls and boys (Julien, 1987). Another intervention occurs
in the form of a program for pre-adolescent boys ranging in age from about 10
to 13. Known as “Boys for Babies” and sponsored by the Toronto Board of
Education, the program description suggests that:
Through learning to bathe, feed, diaper, play with and comfort real babies, boys overcome
their doubts, fears and preconceptions about gender roles. The program validates and
rewards caring and nurturing feelings and behaviour in a boys-only context just at the age
when boys are most urgently concerned with learning how to “be a man.” . . . The boys
are allowed and encouraged by their peers, as well as by the instructor, to demonstrate
gentleness, care, and sensitivity to the babies’ needs, and they see that this in no way
contradicts or diminishes their masculinity. (Wells, 1991, pp. 8–9)
Although mentoring programs and career days based on sex-role analysis often
encouraged girls to be more like boys, this program took the opposite approach
and encouraged boys to be more like girls.
However, as the example of “Boys for Babies” illustrates, although the
research and policy approach which reclaims and revalues women’s lives has
some important benefits, it also has the effect of emphasizing women’s difference and “otherness” from men as well as essentializing women’s experiences
(Fuss, 1989).
MacKinnon (1987) puts the case against the “different but equal” strategy
well. She argues that Gilligan’s emphasis on
the affirmative rather than the negative valuation of that which has accurately
distinguished women from men, . . . mak[es] it seem as though those attributes, with their
consequences, really are somehow ours, rather than what male supremacy has attributed
to us for its own use. For women to affirm difference, when difference means dominance,
as it does with gender, means to affirm the qualities and characteristics of powerlessness.
(pp. 38–39)
ANTI-SEXIST APPROACHES
Another body of research suggests that analyses of sexism in schooling which
emphasize sex-role stereotyping rely on an oversimplified understanding of
complex issues and hide the ways the gendered nature of education is played out
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in the content and practice of schooling (Gaskell, 1992; Mac an Ghaill, 1994;
Ng, Staton, & Scane, 1995; Thorne, 1993; Walkerdine, 1990). Classrooms do not
exist in isolation and individual teachers, however well equipped with curriculum
packages and video-tapes, cannot alone eliminate sexism. Individual efforts to
provide a non-sexist education are doomed to failure, for as Briskin (1990)
argues,
The goal of “non-sexism” (non-racism or non-classism) reflects a belief embedded in
liberalism that discrimination is somehow incidental to the system — a result of prejudice — and that good attitudes and intent can erase that discrimination and make sex, race
and class irrelevant, especially in the classroom. Such a view conceals rather than reveals
structural inequality and institutional limits. (p. 12)
A focus on the systemic nature of sexism and schooling and on developing
antisexist, as opposed to non-sexist, pedagogies is growing.
An explicit example of this can be found in the reasoning behind the Toronto
Board of Education’s parallel four-day retreats on sexism for selected female and
male high school students, which began in 1991. In separate conference centres,
male students, teachers, and facilitators and female students, teachers, and
facilitators meet for three days to discuss a range of topics including sexism in
schools, sexuality, homophobia, violence against women, and family life. On the
fourth day, male and female participants meet together to share their experiences
and to plan for follow-up activities in their schools. The organizers of the retreat,
although acknowledging the importance of equal opportunity and compensatory
programs for girls and women, argued for the importance of going beyond efforts
to create gender equity within existing social structures. They wanted to help
students and teachers
to begin to understand some difficult concepts: One is that sexism is a form of systemic
discrimination which ensures the power of one group in society over another group.
Sexism isn’t just what individuals say or do, it relates to the entire way we’ve set up a
male-dominated society. The second is the perplexing idea that patriarchy is a system not
only of oppression of women, but one that has a contradictory impact on men as well:
men’s privileges and power are linked to the pain and alienation suffered by men themselves. (Novogrodsky, Kaufman, Holland, & Wells, 1992, pp. 69–70)
As well, the organizers worked hard to create experiences for participants that
would not disempower young women by creating a victimization mind-set but
rather would emphasize women’s collective ability to work for change through
women’s movements. Similarly, efforts were made to ensure that young men
were not bogged down with feelings of guilt but could see ways of doing antisexist work in support of women and in challenging the sexist nature of society.
All of this work was done within a context that situated gender in relation to
race, class, ethnicity, and sexual orientation (Novogrodsky et al., 1992).
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The possibility of a policy shift towards a more fundamentally critical antisexist approach can also be seen in the validation draft of the gender-equity
support document recently issued by Ontario’s Ministry of Education and Training (1994). Called Engendering Equity and reflecting some of the more recent
debates in post-structuralist feminist scholarship about education (see Kenway,
Willis, Blackmore, & Rennie, 1994), this document calls for a transformed
curriculum that is much more than “adding on” women. It notes that an inclusive
curriculum “means rethinking the content, form, and context of curriculum” and
requires that the “causes and patterns of sexism, racism, and all forms of
discrimination and prejudice are explored and challenged” (p. 4). The document
critiques the Ministry’s own earlier approaches based on the sex-role stereotyping
analytical framework and argues for antisexist strategies that name inequitable
power relations between men and women and take into account the whole social
context and the intersections of race, class, and sexual orientation with gender
(pp. 11–12). Given the election of the Progressive Conservative government in
Ontario in 1995, it is not clear that Engendering Equity will ever receive final
approval and be distributed widely throughout the province’s schools.
A recent Ontario debate over textbooks contrasts the dominant liberal individualist position with a more radical alternative. In 1987, the FWTAO published
a study of school readers as a follow-up to the study it had commissioned in
1975. The study concluded that:
The ideal Reader world would be one where young people would be welcomed as
cherished members of the human race and are denied nothing because of the accident of
their birth. (Batcher, Winter, & Wright, 1987, p. 43)
It was suggested that readers should show women and men “in equal, caring and
joyful partnerships” and that “human existence is changeable if we want it to be”
(p. 43). The implication is that if educators just want something to happen badly
enough, it will happen. Repo (1988) takes issue with the perspective adopted by
the FWTAO study. Noting that the report recommends that readers portray a
world in which all problems have been eliminated, she goes on to argue that:
The real world out there is still sexist, racist and class-biased. Surely the challenge for
School Readers which are trying to combat these inequalities is to both to [sic] clarify
actual experience and to show protagonists struggling to change this world. This means
that inequalities have to, in the same sense, be named. . . . The resourceful girl protagonist has to be seen functioning — not in some egalitarian paradise — [sic] but in a world
where men are more powerful (and some of them more powerful than others), where she
may not easily find role models and where the prince of her choice may indeed need
reeducation. (Repo, 1988, pp. 150–151)
At stake here is a vision of education. Many teachers, including feminist
teachers, have accepted uncritically that the purpose of schooling is to maximize
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individual development and to help students fit happily into the world. Too few
teachers recognize the political agenda of compliance underpinning this position
and consequently they engage in gender-equity initiatives that do little to aid in
a fundamental transformation of schooling. Gaskell et al. (1989) suggest an
alternative:
Children should be helped to see the world as it is, while being encouraged to develop
a critical consciousness, a sense of active and co-operative participation that equips them
to engage in the struggle for social change. (p. 38)
This debate about textbooks and teaching also provides evidence of a rich and
flourishing feminist scholarship. As understandings of systemic sexism, gender
relations, and patriarchy are developed, these understandings are applied to
schooling, and are re-worked and refined through research on classroom interactions and language use, teaching practices, evaluation methods, gender dynamics
among students, among teachers, and between teachers and students, sexual
harassment in schools, and other topics. The feminist research on women’s
absence from curriculum content and the new scholarship on women evident in
the traditional disciplines has affected debates about what knowledge is of most
worth and what should be included in core and elective subjects.
It is possible to be guardedly optimistic about positive linkages between
research and policy making on gender and education for a number of reasons.
One has to do with the very nature of feminist research. Sydie (1987) has observed that feminist social scientists are the true granddaughters of the founding
fathers such as Weber and Marx, for it is the feminists who continue to observe
the principle that the purpose of research is to understand and solve social
problems. That is, feminist educational research is, for the most part, openly and
consciously about eliminating sexism and contributing to the realization of
gender equity. Because feminist research is often about making change, it is not
surprising that research and policy linkages are forged.
Furthermore, feminist scholars tend to be education activists as well, and
hence their research informs their practice and their practice informs their
research. The women’s movement, too, through its lobbying efforts, focuses the
attention of policy makers on gender, and the “femocrats” (Eisenstein, 1991) are
instrumental in transforming research findings into policy statements. Finally, it
should not escape attention that the majority of teachers are women, albeit white
and middle-class, with a specific stake in understanding and re-working gender
relations. Many research-policy linkages come from the work of teachers.
TEACHERS WORKING FOR CHANGE
Through analysis and political organizing, the Canadian women’s movement has
put women’s inequality on the agenda in this country (Vickers, Rankin, &
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Apelle, 1993). However, the broader community-based or grass-roots women’s
movement, busy with struggles around employment, poverty, child care, violence
against women, reproductive rights, and a host of other issues, has devoted
remarkably little direct attention to girls’ elementary or secondary schooling.
Ironically, though, governments and other institutions have responded to many
demands of the women’s movement by suggesting that the solution is to be
found in education. Eschewing structural or systemic explanations, governments
identify sexism as being simply a “wrong” attitude and target education, especially the schooling of children, as the means to change this attitude. As a result,
governments often pass weak legislation or develop “soft” gender equity through
education policies, designed to offend no one. However, the importance of laws
and policies, inadequate as they might be, should not be underestimated. They
provide a necessary legitimation for educators to raise gender issues in the
schools and offer teachers an opportunity to work out the practical meaning of
equity. Indeed, implementation efforts in the schools have been left primarily to
female teachers working individually (Coulter, 1995), in small groups or networks, with their school boards or federations, or, more commonly, in all these
ways. It is teachers, through their practice, who provide many of the real links
between research/theory and policy.
Julien (1987) found that teacher federations are the most active agents in
providing teachers with the knowledge and tools to understand and implement
gender-equity policies. One teachers’ federation, the FWTAO, merits special
mention because it has had since its birth in 1918 the explicit goal of improving
the status of female public elementary school teachers and the situation of
women generally (French, 1968; Labatt, 1993; Staton & Light, 1987). FWTAO
members, together with other female teachers, have been active participants in
struggles to achieve child-welfare legislation, minimum wages for women,
maternity leave, equal pay for equal work, and other social reforms (Prentice et
al., 1988). More recently, in the early 1970s, the FWTAO was instrumental in
the establishment of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women and
it continues to support the organization to this day (Staton & Light, 1987). The
FWTAO has focused much of its energy on promoting opportunities for women
in educational leadership and on developing materials to combat sex-role stereotyping in the classroom. Within this federation, liberal feminism, combined with
elements of the ethics of care taken from radical/cultural feminism, has proven
dominant.
The history of the BCTF Status of Women Program provides another illustration of work through teacher federations. In 1969 a small group of female
teachers in British Columbia, influenced by the growth of women’s liberation,
began to talk about their shared concerns with respect to sex discrimination in
education. In that year they formed a group called “Women in Teaching.” In
1970 the group wrote to the BCTF urging the executive to read and discuss the
report of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women which had appeared
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that year. As a result, the BCTF established a task force on sex discrimination
in school systems. One member of Women in Teaching, Linda Shuto, was asked
to join that task force. Shuto found that “the members of the task force had
considerable differences of opinion concerning the nature and extent of sex
discrimination in our school system” (Shuto, 1974, p. 1). She ended up submitting a minority report to the BCTF’s Executive Committee when the task force
reported in 1971. The Executive, apparently more sympathetic to her consciously
feminist analysis, accepted the minority report and then struck a new task force
in 1972. The second task force reported in 1973, and five of the seven recommendations sent to the 1973 Annual Meeting of the BCTF passed. As a result,
the BCTF extended the life of the Status of Women Task Force and hired a
full-time staff person to work in the area. Shuto was the first person seconded
to this position for a fixed term of two years. Over the years several other female
teachers have been seconded to the program, which is now well entrenched in
the BCTF and operates at the local and provincial levels.
From its inception, the BCTF Status of Women Program consciously emphasized two goals. The first was to find and educate local teachers who would
build the Status of Women Program in each school district. Exemplifying the
best of union and feminist organizing, considerable attention was given to
initiating and maintaining local programs and developing communication networks within the province. The second objective was “to stress that the program
is one designed to help solve sex discrimination in the education system, not a
vehicle for women to rise in the hierarchical structure” (Shuto, 1974, p. 2). Thus
the BCTF program opted for a focus on curriculum, classroom interactions, and
teacher attitudes rather than on personal advancement for individual female
teachers, and reflected the BCTF’s continuing commitment to social responsibility. The Status of Women Program emphasized the links among sexism, racism,
and classism and named “the system under which we live, . . . a system that
values competition, aggression and domination over co-operation and sharing and
caring about other people” (Shuto, 1975, p. 5) as being responsible for, among
other things, the oppression of women. The influence of socialist feminist
thought here is clear.
During its first year (1973–1974), the Status of Women Task Force held a
series of intensive meetings with 41 local teacher associations and with all
educational stakeholders, including community and women’s groups. Status of
Women contact people were named in 72 locals. A major conference for teachers
and the public was organized and registration had to be capped at 500. As Shuto
(1984) put it, “The times were with us. Preparations for ‘1975, International Year
of Women,’ were underway. Women’s programs and groups were blossoming
everywhere. Media attention was high” (p. 12). As teachers’ consciousness of the
issues was raised, teachers began actively to support the program. The task force
was able to use the resources and existing structure of the BCTF to build a
Status of Women network, provide in-service activities for teachers, organize
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workshops and conferences for students and teachers, develop materials for
classroom use, prepare briefs for presentation to school boards, and get Status of
Women representatives onto local executives. Internally, efforts were made to
integrate women’s issues into all divisions of the Federation so that women’s
issues were not isolated or seen as of concern only to the members of the Task
Force on the Status of Women. The BCTF also was active in encouraging statusof-women activities across the rest of the country. It initiated the first CTF
conference on women’s issues (Grove, 1984, p. 13). Entitled “Challenge ’76:
Sexism in Schools,” the conference brought together delegates from all the CTF
member federations to discuss the issues and to develop organizational strategies
for action, strategies which were then shared through a series of publications
(Canadian Teachers’ Federation, 1976, 1977). By 1977, and as a result of all this
work, the Task Force achieved recognition as a permanent committee of the
BCTF (Roberts, 1984, p. 14). By the late 1970s, most other provincial teacher
federations had women’s committees and programs of one kind or another
(Julien, 1987).
Teachers have also worked through more broadly based coalitions to effect
change. A good example of this strategy can be found in a recently formed
Ontario organization called Educators for Gender Equity (EDGE). The London
secondary school teachers who founded EDGE explicitly acknowledged the
importance of feminist educational research and theory to their thinking. One
noted,
I grew into feminism quite naturally because of my life experiences. Feminist theory, a
lot of feminist theory that I then read in those years [while at university], was what I had
already lived. . . . It wasn’t a sort of, you know, conversion experience either although
some people thought I was suddenly a born again feminist. I grew into it intellectually
. . . and quite naturally, I think, too, because I was exposed to it at university. (P. Dalton,
personal communication, 9 April 1996)
Another teacher talked about the importance of taking a women’s studies course
as part of her personal in-service professional development.
That was really a big boost because I now had the vocabulary to define my experience
that I hadn’t had before, and I also had a community to confirm what I had been thinking.
. . . Having the language is incredibly powerful. (J. Pennycook, personal communication,
17 April 1996)
These teachers have used their understandings and knowledge to work on gender
issues with their students in the school setting. Their activities have included
establishing gender-equity clubs in secondary schools and organizing a boardwide annual equity conference for students.
The founders of EDGE also work within the local branch of the OSSTF and
some are key members of the Status of Women Committee. Through this group
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they plan and implement a range of professional development activities, including
lectures and workshops. Some teachers also have played an active role in a key
co-operative venture with the London Board of Education. A joint federationboard committee, the Gender-Balanced Resource Committee, developed a
resource document, for all teachers in the system, which integrated feminist
curriculum and pedagogical theory with a practical approach to classroom
teaching (London Board of Education, 1995).
Concurrently, however, while these teachers continued, or even accelerated
their activities within the federation and the board, they decided there was a need
for a wider network that could include government bureaucrats, equity officers,
and senior administrators from the school boards, professors of education,
students, teachers, and even non-educators interested in gender and educationrelated issues. A network formed outside of official structures appeared to be an
effective strategy to move the equity agenda forward. As one of the founders
observed, “I think being outside of the federation has a lot of advantages because
right now we are self-funded” (P. Dalton, personal communication, 9 April
1996). This guarantees an independence that allows EDGE to pursue whatever
initiatives it desires without worrying about the sensitivities of teacher federations
or school boards.
Currently, EDGE serves two main purposes. One is the networking function.
Members exchange information, discuss specific problems, and provide support
and resources to one another. They are able to track the impact of economic and
educational restructuring on equity work. As an adult educator put it, “there’s a
basic common understanding of the fact these issues need to be addressed, and
what are we going to do, and let’s think about strategies” (K. Ball, personal
communication, 16 April 1996). The second major purpose is self-education.
EDGE meetings provide opportunities, through speakers and workshops, for
members to hear about and discuss current research in education. At these meetings time is spent thinking about various aspects of gender reform, about linking
equity work on race, class, and gender, and about the politics of economics and
education. In other words, EDGE meetings are a forum in which explicit linkages
between research, policy, and practice can be explored, where those who do the
research, write the policies, and teach the students can talk across and through
differences in understandings and experiences.
CONCLUSION
Although the recent history of gender-equity initiatives in education illustrates
the ways in which research and policy are linked through the practical work of
classroom teachers, it also demonstrates how complex and context-dependent
social change is. At specific historical moments, events have conspired to make
gender equity more or less possible. In the early 1970s, the social context, which
included a vibrant women’s movement, the Report of the Royal Commission on
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the Status of Women in Canada (1970), and an International Women’s Year,
provided the stage for feminist educators to take up the case for non-sexist
schooling. The growth of feminist research and the introduction of women’s
studies courses at universities provided the language and theory for policy
possibilities; the demands of the women’s movement created the political climate
for policy development. Teacher federations, such as the FWTAO and the BCTF,
with historical commitments to social justice, provided institutional structures for
teachers wishing to take up the gender-equity agenda. And individual teachers,
working in provinces in which they had opportunities to co-operate with and
receive support from the wider women’s movement, were most successful in
making use of the specific constellation of circumstances facing them.
The policy framework established during the 1970s proved to be remarkably
resilient. It has been taken up by federal and provincial governments seeking to
demonstrate their commitment to women’s equality without in any fundamental
way threatening existing power and economic arrangements. Explanations drawn
from sex-role socialization theory proved capable of driving a large number of
initiatives stemming from 1980s policy concerns about girls and women in
science and technology. With the attention of the women’s movement given over
to concerns about employment and the economy and to the politics of difference,
there was little public demand for further action in the area of schooling. Teachers attempting, as part of their implementation strategy, to incorporate new
research into public policies on gender equity toiled in relative isolation.
By the late 1980s and into the 1990s, the social context for policy making was
changing drastically. The full impact of economic restructuring is now being felt
in the public sector and public education itself is under attack. Women are
proving to be particularly vulnerable to the neo-liberal agenda of reduced social
spending (Brodie, 1995, 1996; Dacks, Green, & Trimble, 1995). The emphasis
on “self-reliance” and rampant individualism threatens any systemic or structural
interpretation of gender-equity policies. A perfect example of this can be seen in
Ontario, where the government is proposing to remove the current sex-equity
policy from the secondary school program of studies and to replace it with an
antidiscrimination statement that does not even mention gender (Ontario Ministry
of Education and Training, 1996). In addition, ideological hostility to gender
equity is revealed in a number of ways, including the “political correctness
debate” (Ayim, 1996; Smith, 1995) and various forms of resistance (Kenway,
1995).
Much of teacher federations’ attention has, of necessity, been focused on
defending public education, and teachers, faced with threats to their job security,
salaries, time, and autonomy, have been less able to devote energy to genderequity issues. The political activity of the women’s movement is focused on
employment, poverty, and social security, and schooling is far down the agenda.
In the short run, the necessary conditions for linking new research to policy
development appear to be largely absent, and insofar as any policies on gender
448
equity survive educational restructuring, they will remain policies shaped by
sex-role socialization theory. Teachers working for change in this context face
an uphill battle but they retain some optimism. One of the founders of EDGE
observed that he and his colleagues are “in there for the long haul and are not
going to be deterred by the sorts of things that happen” (J. Wilson, personal
communication, 17 April 1996). This note of optimism, tinged with a sense of
reality, reveals that efforts to link research and policy will not disappear; they
will simply find new, and probably more local, arenas.
NOTES
1
An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1994 symposium organized by the Canadian
Society for the Study of Education to discuss “the widening gap between educational policy and
research across the country” (S. Cook, personal communication, 22 January 1994).
2
Bailey (1993) provides an excellent example of work done by teacher-researchers. See also Barton
(1994), Hart (1996), and Ortwein (1996) for examples of teachers’ research completed as part of
their graduate work. Nor should it be forgotten that most professors of education, myself included,
have been classroom teachers, as have researchers such as Briskin (1990) and Larkin (1994).
3
Until recently feminists have commonly been categorized as liberal, radical, or socialist. Liberal
feminists argue for equal opportunities, seek to identify and remove barriers to women’s success,
and theorize sex inequalities through the sex-role socialization framework. Radical feminists, often
called cultural feminists, are concerned with structural issues and tend to focus on the role of the
school in reproducing the power relations of patriarchy and on the sexual politics of schooling.
Socialist feminists, influenced by neo-Marxist theories, tend to focus on the economy and the
family; to the extent that they consider education at all, they are concerned with how the schools
work to replicate the social relations of gender, race, and class. This brief summary does not, of
course, do justice to the three approaches to education, which are discussed in more detail in
Acker (1994), Kenway (1990), and Stromquist (1990). These three authors note the difficulties
of cleanly and simply categorizing approaches to gender reform in education and also remark on
the growing influence of a post-structuralist feminism. Adamson, Briskin, and McPhail (1988) and
Wine and Ristock (1991) claim that Canadian feminists have, in practice, worked across their
differing political positions and agree more than they disagree. Nonetheless, the three categories
provide an heuristic device for broadly differentiating theoretical understandings and approaches
to equity issues in education.
4
How effective these policies are is a different question. Recent assessments of learning materials
(Batcher et al., 1987; Light, Staton, & Bourne, 1989) suggest that antibias policies have not been
adequately implemented and textbooks are far from non-sexist.
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Essais Critiques / Review Essays
Racism in Canadian Schools:
Untested Assumptions
Racism in Canadian Schools
Edited by Ibrahim Alladin
Toronto: Harcourt Brace, 1996. xi+179 pages. ISBN 0-7747-3492-2 (pbk.)
REVIEWED BY JOHN KEHOE, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
I do not recommend Racism in Canadian Schools. Although the various chapters
contain a few nuggets of worthwhile information, the book is plagued with
conceptual confusion, it makes unsupported empirical claims, and it does not
include research on reducing racism that should be included in such a book. I
find evidence for these conclusions in almost every section of the book.
For example, in the chapter “Racism in Schools: Race, Ethnicity, and Schooling in Canada,” Ibrahim Alladin claims that “the school . . . has become an
instrument whose function is primarily to sustain and legitimize the status quo”
(p. 4). Most of the research that I have read since as early as 1957 shows an
inverse relationship between prejudice and level of education. Then Alladin
contends that “the minority groups who occupy subordinate positions within the
society are both economically and socially disadvantaged” (p. 5). Doesn’t being
economically and socially disadvantaged mean to be subordinate? Alladin also
suggests that “in urban centres, visible minorities have experienced widespread
discrimination in housing, employment, and education” (p. 9). Surely a claim so
fundamental to the thesis of the book should be supported with research showing
discrimination in all three areas. He then maintains that “a recent study by the
Canadian Council of Christians and Jews found that racism in Canada is increasing. One in four Canadians (25 percent) believe that there is ‘a great deal of
racism in Canada’” (p. 10). These statistics do not show change in perception
from a previous time; they simply reveal what Canadians believe rather than
what systematic research demonstrates.
In another chapter, “Black/African-Canadian Students’ Perspectives on School
Racism,” George Dei points out that research has shown “that race does have
significance in school and that many minority students who ‘succeed’ have
done so at the expense of a negation of their racial identities” (p. 43). This
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21, 4 (1996): 453–457
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phenomenon is clearly regrettable. But it would be helpful if the author were
more explicit. What aspects of their racial identities have successful individuals
had to give up? Only when that information is available can a productive dialogue begin between the school and the minority community.
Dei also calls for “an exploration of how school policies restrict the educational opportunities of Black students” (p. 45), and advocates a policy of
“inclusion.” Granted, schools need help in determining just what are the educational practices of “inclusion.” To that end, Dei offers evidence from his own
study of how the experiences of Black/African youth may inform our understanding of the problem of students becoming disengaged and eventually dropping out.
From his interviews of more than 200 high-school students, he concludes that
there would be reduced disengagement and dropping out if teachers did not have
low expectations of students. This finding raises a number of questions. How do
we identify a racist teacher? Should a re-education program be required of
teachers so identified? And if that fails, should they be removed from the classroom? Most of us agree that people who are racist, sexist, and homophobic
should not be teachers.
Dei makes several other claims: that if students knew themselves, their culture,
and their history, and if that knowledge were provided by the school, then there
would be fewer drop-outs; that many Black youths make a direct connection
between the problem of disengagement and the lack of representation of Black
role models in the schools; that educators should openly discuss the concept of
race in their classroom teaching; that teachers have to challenge their students to
enrol in the “culture of success,” not in the “culture of failure”; that it is important for Canadian educators to educate Black/African youths about their
Africanity by affirming Black/African traditional values and cultural patterns in
the school system; and that teachers should be prepared to engage in issueoriented teaching, to teach about resistance, and to recognize social oppression
and institutionalized inequality. These claims are worthy of close attention, but
close attention is not enough. Dei’s hypothesis is that if schools implemented the
practices underlying his claims there would be less disengagement and fewer
drop-outs. But until that hypothesis is tested, it remains unproven.
In Augie Fleras’ chapter, “Behind the Ivy Walls: Racism/Antiracism in
Academe,” I was impressed by the low levels of racism reported from campuses
on which statistics have been kept. At York University only 3% of 1,300 persons
sampled stated that they had experienced racism on campus. And only 10% of
the sample were thought to possess potentially racist attitudes. Between 1988 and
1993 the number of racist incidents reported yearly ranged from 30 to 68.
Although the methodology was different, the statistics from the University of
Western Ontario in a 1989 study are a little more disturbing: of approximately
800 respondents to a questionnaire, 9.1% acknowledged they were victims of a
racist incident, and nearly 200 had witnessed one of 261 racial incidents on
campus in the previous year. The University of Western Ontario handled 36
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455
complaints in one year, and the University of Windsor reported 22 race-related
complaints in a year.
But Fleras then writes a paragraph explaining why the numbers are so low —
a paragraph that would not have had to be written if the numbers had been
higher. The author maintains that “in sum, racism continues to be perceived and
experienced as a campus menace — despite a dearth of supporting statistical data”
(p. 66). The author seems curiously reluctant to accept good news. Given limited
resources for fighting racism, I recommend that attention be devoted to those
populations and institutions exhibiting high levels of racism. The universities are
not perfect but they seem to be among the best.
In a chapter on “Dealing with Racism and Cultural Diversity in the Curriculum,” John P. Anchan and Lenore Holychuk claim that stereotypes persist in
textbooks and other sources. “The dualities we tend to define, such as civilized
vs. uncivilized, developed vs. undeveloped, modern vs. primitive, rich vs. poor,
believers vs. heathens, and us vs. them or other, have long been due for critical
questioning” (p. 94). This very serious charge should be substantiated either by
an analysis of textbooks or, even better, by an assessment of student beliefs
about their understanding of these concepts. Do students view the world from
these dichotomies, and do they evaluate negatively the uncivilized, heathen, and
so on?
Someone wiser than I once observed that the history of education is a history
of untested assumptions. Here are a few examples from this chapter. “[E]mpower
students of diverse cultures by recognizing their languages, histories, and existence” (p. 97). “A curriculum which values diverse cultures in an equitable way
is self-affirming” (p. 97). “In containing a more accurate representation of
minority groups, an ‘inclusive curriculum’ establishes a greater understanding
and awareness of diverse cultures” (p. 97). “Through the sharing of literature,
teachers and students develop . . . empathy for how human beings ought to treat
each other” (p. 101). “Novels provide these students with a more intense opportunity to develop a deeper understanding of the complexity surrounding racism
and how these differences can be acted upon” (p. 101). The logic of these claims
is compelling, but they are simply claims. Until they have been tested, they
cannot be accepted.
In “Point of View in Literary Texts: A Perspective on Unexamined Racist
Ideologies in the High School English Curriculum,” Ingrid Johnston points out
that “teachers hope that reading literature will contribute towards a positive self
concept for all students, including those from minority groups, by eradicating
notions of gender, racial, or class superiority” (p. 109). She then lists and describes a number of books that will cause students to be less sexist and less racist.
Again, the reader is offered a set of untested assumptions. Finally, the author
makes the point that most books selected for use are written by white authors,
with narratives dependent upon the perspectives of white protagonists. Johnston
provides us with some examples of books written by minority authors with
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minority people as the main protagonists. It would be an important study to
articulate what the different effects of these books might be and then test them.
Terrance Carson, in his chapter on “The Failure of Educational Experts,”
contends that theories of learning, child development, and instructional methods
assume a universal child and universal teacher. I contend that the purpose of
theory is to explain and predict, and if what is being taught in Faculties of Education does not explain and predict the international classroom then it is not a
theory.
In “Dealing with Racism in the Community: Response from Alex Taylor
Community School,” Ibrahim Alladin and Steve Ramsankar offer a definition of
racism as the social attitudes, social structures, and action that oppress, exclude,
limit, and discriminate against non-dominant ethno-racial groups. Alex Taylor
Community School challenges racist behaviour in the school and the community,
and presumably causes both to be less racist. How do they do this? First, every
student is hugged every day. Second, the principal reminds the children that,
“We are a family. All of us help each other. The school is a home away from
home” (p. 148). Third, the school celebration of the Chinese New Year causes
everyone to understand and respect one another. Fourth, students participate in
activities that foster positive relationships and avoid situations that will hurt
people. Fifth, new Canadians are given a “buddy,” who becomes a friend. Sixth,
parents are encouraged to recognize and understand cultural differences, for
instance, the Sweetgrass Ceremony. Seventh, by studying and recognizing
different cultures and cultural events, the school celebrates the Canadian mosaic
and teaches the children respect and acceptance of differences. Eighth, overseas
educational tours are organized. Ninth, there is an emphasis on self-esteem. But
these activities are all consistent with multicultural education, a very different
topic from antiracist education.
In “Strategies for an Antiracist Education,” John Ewan Rymer and Ibrahim
Alladin promise to examine “how racism is manifested and dealt with in the
classrooms.” Their chapter also “questions current classroom practices and offers
alternative strategies for an education that is inclusive and antiracist” (p. 157).
But, again, the authors make a series of statements that lack supporting evidence.
Here are some examples: “Before one embarks on the processes involved in the
antiracist education of others, it is essential to investigate the roots of our own
misconceptions, suppositions, biases, and stereotypic beliefs” (p. 159). “After
years of working in multicultural settings and with a variety of ethnic groups one
can pride one’s self in being free of erroneous assumptions” (p. 159). “Only
through being aware of the anomalies that may be present in our daily experiences can we investigate the roots of racism that exists in all of us” (p. 159).
Antiracist education “will challenge the concepts of the status quo, particularly
the nature and distribution of power in society” (p. 160). The teacher must
model “honesty, integrity, fair mindedness, justice, open mindedness, regard for
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evidence, curiosity, a reflective habit and judicious skepticism” (p. 161). “For the
students to deconstruct and ultimately reconstruct their own knowledge, the use
of constructivist epistemology will be required” (p. 161). According to the
authors, if the policies and actions represented in these (and similar) quotations
are put in place, then equality, justice, and emancipation will pervade both
classrooms and society. Again, a set of untested assumptions.
There are far too many books that offer methodologies designed to encourage
students to be less racist and more accepting of cultural diversity. Far too many
of those books do not provide any empirical research for their claims. Racism in
Canadian Schools is especially notorious in this regard.
Funny, This Doesn’t Read Like Educational
Theory
“That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Like a Teacher”: Interrogating Images and
Identity in Popular Culture
By Sandra Weber & Claudia Mitchell
London: The Falmer Press, 1995. xii+156 pages. ISBN 0-7507-0413-6 (pbk.)
REVIEWED BY SUZANNE DE CASTELL, SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY
“Ahhrummph. Everything is like something else. The Philosopher asks, “What is this
like?”
— Sir Isaiah Berlin, on learning how to do philosophy. [Apocryphal]
“The weight of tradition . . . hangs like a nightmare on the brain of the living.”
— Benjamin/Marx
Like likes like.
— Gertrude Stein [Apocryphal]
What is it, in the age of “simulation,” to be “like” something else? To be un-like
it? And in what terms is such a “likeness” to be clad? Sir Isaiah would say “what
question is this question like?” And indeed there are enormous attractions to such
a spiralling within disciplinary discourses, engaging with the structures of that
species of epistemic “call and response” an academic text is so well-equipped to
produce. This is not a trivial point. For there is an extent to which the discourses
of a discipline, its very apparatus of articulation, come gradually to overtake their
capacity to carry other meanings. Educational theory, it might be argued, has
reached precisely that point; it is time to change tools.
Attention to representational forms, Scott Lash reminds us, is a defining
feature of the postmodern, which displaces questions about the truth of representation vis-à-vis its represented subject, in favour of questions about representation
itself — how produced, why, and by whom, about what such representation
produces, and how it has its effects. Postmodernism marks a shift from printbased to image-based technologies, as rhetorical analysis becomes increasingly
able to indicate the ways in which texts — in this case, educational texts — may
come to write themselves. Like a replicator run amok, the discursive apparatus
of educational theory exhausts itself in an endless repetition of structures —
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redemptive narratives of “experience,” ventriloquated in speech genres ranging
from reassurances about “caring” to exhortations about “change,” “challenge,”
and “excellence,” riddled throughout with formulaic utterances invoking, less as
concepts than as Proper Names, “empowerment,” “oppositional consciousness,”
and “moments of possibility.” In this carnivalesque theoretical midway of rigged
games and loaded dice, the discourse virtually speaks itself. And so a new
species of discursive ethics of textual production is called for, a new “rhetorical
responsibility” that compels serious reconsideration of the forms and media in
which educational theorists elect to represent themselves and the subjects of their
attention. For our fascination with, absorption by, and somewhat myopic approval
of written language forms that, increasingly over time and with what Benjamin
called the “weight of tradition,” write us — is in some sense, I think, the point
of Sandra Weber and Claudia Mitchell’s small, pleasurable, and useful book,
“That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Like a Teacher,” which pays attention to the
means through which, the “visible signs” by which, likenesses and UN-likenesses
are permitted into legitimate disciplinary discourse. “Canonical” educational
theory assumes, from such a perspective, an archaic and narrow form.
This wonderful book is about moving in illuminating ways from textual to
visual representations salient to the practices of teaching and the “role” and
representations of “teacher” in teacher education, in the construction of educational theory, and in the design, conduct, and interpretation of research. Subtitled
Interrogating Images and Identity in Popular Culture, the book brings together
popular cultural and media studies to articulate an intergenerational, multiplymediated “cumulative cultural text” of “teacher” and “teaching.” Weber and
Mitchell describe their study as “a collective biography of teachers, revealing the
contributions of social, fictional, fantasy and private worlds to the construction
of the cumulative cultural text called teacher” (p. 9). Accordingly, their reading
of popular representations encompasses films, toys, books, television programs,
games, personal and collective memories, hopes, and imaginings, and drawings
by students, teachers, and student teachers. They declare of their “collective
autobiography” that it
embraces several forbidden themes, including gender, romance and sexuality . . . [juxtaposing] themes and . . . cultures that have traditionally been excluded from the discourse
of teacher education: childhood and popular culture; play and schooling; sex, pleasure
and pedagogy; the illicitness of popular culture and the prescribed structures of schooling;
the simultaneously conservative and revolutionary forces in mass culture and schooling.
(p. 10)
Can all this be accomplished in just 140 pages of consistently entertaining and
insightful text? Yes, and admirably so, in the case of this short volume, which
moves easily between erudite yet accessible discussions of deconstructionist
theory and movie criticisms, product reviews, and the pictures, words, and stories
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of children and their teachers. A superb introductory text for any foundations or
teacher preparation course that takes cultural studies seriously, this book will
prove invaluable as a vehicle for discussion that moves away from and far ahead
of the now worn and tedious “dialogues” about student “voice” and teacher
“experience,” as students are encouraged to take seriously such questions as
“Why don’t we know more about the ways in which we as teachers occupy the
consciousness of children?” (p. 11). What is thereby disowned, and why? What
is it that teachers do not care to understand about who and what, from a popular
cultural standpoint, they appear to be?
That teachers might productively reconsider the terms in which and the frames
within which contemporary educational discourse is (re)formed is illustrated in
a series of mostly very interesting and always thought-provoking chapters. A
discussion of stereotypes and “identity” makes clear the significance of the
extent to which interrogating popular cultural representations offers readers a
richer and more complex picture of the received and lived-out meanings of
“teacher” than is accessible through traditional textual vehicles for intellectual
inquiry, “mak[ing] it possible for people to surpass received knowledge and
tradition” (Giroux & Simon, quoted on p. 26), and as well to recognize and
come clearly to grips with the extent to which dominant images of “the teacher”
are rooted in and perpetuate profoundly traditional, even archaic, stereotypes. Of
particular interest is a set of drawings reproduced in the text by students of both
sexes and various ages, and by teachers at different stages in their professional
development. Arguing for the important communicative function of drawing,
Mitchell and Weber emphasize that
Much of what we have seen of known, thought or imagined, remembered or repressed,
slips unbidden into our drawings, revealing unexplored ambiguities, contradictions and
connections. That which we have forgotten, that which we might censor from our speech
and writing, often escapes into our drawings. (p. 34)
With that in mind, in the first class of my doctoral seminar in educational theory
I asked the students to take up my proffered box of crayolas and “draw a
teacher.” The disturbing patterns of gender-differentiated representations, the
emergence of stereotypical signs (the apple, maths on the chalkboard, the pointer,
spelling words, lists of rules, and the like) all appeared, to my astonishment, even
in this sophisticated and critical group. An intriguing discussion of clothing as
a kind of quasi “speech code” in circulation and expected to be acquired by all
would-be teachers brings to light the intensity of the pressure to conform, and the
extent to which failure to “look like a teacher” may jeopardize any ability to
“act” like one. The performativity of teacher-identity is underscored here.
For a study of the codes of romance in popular cultural discourses focused on
“teaching,” Mitchell and Weber examine as (unlikely!) primary texts the Sweet
Valley High young adult fiction series, My Little Pony TV cartoons, a U.S.
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sitcom called Boy Meets World, and the mysteries of Nancy Drew. From these
they produce a reading articulated intertextually in relation to a set of paradigmatic Hollywood films, from the classic To Sir, With Love to a contemporary
fantasy of gender and power, Kindergarten Cop, revealing the ways teachers are
heroized and romanticized, and they ask “What are the contributions of such
romantic texts to the evolution of classrooms as gendered landscape?” (and
raced, classed, and sexualized, I might add). “What is their impact on teacher
identity?” (p. 93).
After an instructive and engaging excursion focused on the occupation of the
teacher’s role by Arnold Schwarzenegger and Barbie, respectively (and there is
surely a lot to say about the aptness of the selection here), Weber and Mitchell
settle their critical focus on what they term “the gendered landscape of schooling.” Much of the discussion here is, well, predictable (if always entertaining and
informed). And, returning to the question of what is it that we as teachers do not
care to understand about who and what we appear to be, and to the questions of
what is thereby disowned, and why, I wondered why I found myself increasingly
troubled as I approached the end of what had proven such a rewarding book.
What it was, I realized after a while, was precisely the omissions — what I would
identify as “what we don’t want to know about who and what we appear to be.”
And without in any way wanting to detract from the richness of the critical
analysis of gender in teaching contained in this text, I began to see what wasn’t
there, and to wonder why it was not. In the first place, a relatively sparse
attention to issues of class, race, and sexuality left questions of “gender” (which
the authors had initially promised deeply to interrogate) looking far simpler that
I think they prove to be. In teaching, class matters, not least because that profession features as one of the most typical routes (and more so for women) to
economic mobility. There is surely, then, an implicit demand for a rather different species of “class analysis” than the one readers get here. And race matters
enormously — witness the great efforts that have had to be expended at institutions like York University to recruit into teacher education students from nonmainstream backgrounds (and the significant absence of such teacher-education
students in Faculties of Education that have yet to “bother” with this highly
visible absence). Finally, I was struck that apart from one reference to “sexuality” early in the text, and later on, mention of a male teacher “labelled gay”
(p. 105), and references to students’ “crushes” on same-sex teachers (pp. 109,
122), despite both the “forbidden-ness” of the topic of sexuality in schools, and
its centrality in student and school culture, the significance of sexuality to who
can and who cannot “look like a teacher” was nowhere dealt with. Yet I recall
studies of teacher evaluation published in the Simon Fraser University faculty
newsletter which established that whether a teacher were male or female was not
what correlated with negative or positive evaluations by students: rather, whether
male or female, it was gender-“inappropriateness” that dealt the killing blow to
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perceived teacher success — not surprising, in an institutional context in which
“fag” and “lezzie” are the insults most greatly to be feared, and the identities
least likely to succeed. What is surprising is that in such a thoughtful book, so
little — no, worse yet, no serious attention (even in a discussion of the implications of “cross-dressing”) is paid to “masculinities” other than heterosexual, to
the reality that “women teachers” might be other than straight, white, and middle
class. My impatience and increasing discomfort with the text, then, stemmed
from a growing realization that not only are queer teachers and students not
present in the text, they are not even imagined as its readers. And so I am left
asking myself what is it that we do not want to know about the identities we
occupy? And why do we want to disown this knowledge? To put it another way,
what are the terms and conditions of critical discussion in education? What is the
trade-off? In the promised telling of “forbidden tales,” what bargain is made
within the heteronormative “economy” of educational discourse, even as its limits
and boundaries are otherwise pushed and challenged? And who pays the price
of critical inquiry with their own silence?
It would be miserly indeed to place too much weight on what (so I think) this
book fails to take up. But when hopes are so greatly raised by its stand, and
when so much else is delivered, what began, perhaps, as one small, even “idle”
question may come increasingly to take up a central significance — at least for
those readers themselves rendered invisible and inaudible by so puzzlingly
selective a representation. Who, after all, will we allow ourselves to be like?
Well, as Gertrude Stein may have said, “Like likes like.”
Beyond Liberation and Excellence: Reconstructing the Public Discourse on
Education
By David E. Purpel & Svi Shapiro
Westport, CT: Bergin & Garvey, 1995. xxiv+224 pages. ISBN 0-7872-1110-9
(pbk.)
REVIEWED BY JERROLD R. COOMBS, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
This work is primarily hortatory rather than analytical. Convinced that American
society is in a profound and dangerous crisis, Purpel and Shapiro issue a plea for
educators to assume a role of leadership in transforming American schools and
society. The crisis they identify has a number of aspects, including the possibility
of economic collapse, the imminence of ecological disaster, and the prevalence
of violence. In their view, current educational policies and practices exacerbate
the crisis because they legitimate inexcusable injustices, and reinforce the
competitive, materialistic, and uncaring attitudes that have been instrumental in
producing it.
The authors claim that although American society requires major structural
change to respond to this crisis, prominent proposals for educational reform are
banal and timid. Moreover, educators by and large have not challenged the moral
and economic presuppositions of the various proposals for reform. If education
is to help resolve the crisis rather than deepen it, argue Purpel and Shapiro,
professional educators need to foster a new sort of public discourse concerning
our broad social and cultural values and priorities, and their relation to our
educational goals and policies. They must persuade the public to accept a
different vision of educational purposes than that which is now dominant.
To aid educators in participating in public debate, Purpel and Shapiro suggest
the kind of discourse and reform agenda educators should adopt. Although
avowedly sympathetic to the work of critical theorists and advocates of critical
pedagogy, the authors contend that the discourse of the Left is too restrictive. To
the critical theorist’s discourse on social justice, liberation, and participatory
democracy, they want to add discourse on caring, compassion, community,
responsibility, peace, and joy. Such a discourse, they argue, would enable
persons to put forth a new vision of America’s possibilities as a society without
privileging any one group.
The agenda for reform offered by Purpel and Shapiro is represented as being
merely illustrative of the direction that reform strategies might take. They regard
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the concerns that shape the educational agenda in the U.S.A. at present as a good
starting point, but suggest that educators give a “transformative twist” to them.
Concern with teaching basics, for example, should be reconceptualized to include
preparing students for active participation in civic life. The long-range objective
of the reform agenda is an education directed at promoting community, justice,
compassion, and meaning, rather than one promoting competition, achievement,
and domination.
Although it is easy to agree with Purpel and Shapiro’s view that both
education and society should be reformed to be more just, compassionate, and
caring, I wonder about the efficacy of their approach. The likelihood of their
galvanizing educators to action would appear to be dependent upon their
convincing educators of the existence of the crisis they have identified. Many
educators, as the authors acknowledge, perceive no such crisis. Because the
authors have not produced any arguments to substantiate their claims about a
crisis that are not already common currency among educators, it seems unlikely
these non-believers will be converted.
However, even educators who are unconvinced of the existence of a crisis may
agree with the authors’ view that they should take a more active role in the
public debate about educational purposes. What is not clear is whether they are
equipped to play the role Purpel and Shapiro assign them, namely determining
the nature and scope of the issues and framing important questions, rather than
simply offering technical advice. There is little reason to suppose that the
training and experience of educators typically provides them with a particularly
good grasp of issues relating to social policy and the aims of public education.
Thus they would appear to have no special authority to determine the scope of
issues or to determine how they should be framed.
Assuming educators can acquire the critical acumen and understanding
necessary for playing the role Purpel and Shapiro assign them, why should they
adopt the proposed agenda? The authors give essentially two reasons. First, they
argue that the proposed agenda is based on persons’ real needs and concerns, that
is, economic security, opportunity, self-esteem, the sense of community life
bound by moral commitment, and a sense of personal meaning. Granted that
these are genuine needs, and that their agenda succeeds in reflecting them, this
is nonetheless a fairly weak argument. Depending upon how these needs are
prioritized and what additional assumptions are made about the efficacy of
various social institutions, any number of different and conflicting agendas may
be thought to reflect them. The authors aver that their agenda is antithetical to
capitalism, for example, but defenders of capitalism may well argue that it offers
the best hope of securing these genuine needs. Thus this argument is unlikely to
be persuasive to educators firmly wedded to capitalism.
The second arm of their argument is that their agenda, with its emphasis on
renewing a concern for community, justice, compassion, and meaning, is rooted
in Americans’ oldest, most revered traditions and aspirations. That these do
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represent cherished aspirations seems to me incontestable, but it is also incontestable that economic success is a cherished aspiration, and this aspiration seems
to be the primary motivation for the system of schooling Purpel and Shapiro
want to reform. What they are seeking, then, is not the replacement of weakly
held values with ones that are more deeply rooted. Rather, they seek a reordering
of priorities for public education and social policy. Simply showing that compassion and concern for community are cherished values does not permit one to
conclude that these should take precedence over economic success as values to
be realized through public schooling. So once again educators are given no
compelling reason for adopting the Purpel-Shapiro agenda for reform.
La recherche en éducation comme source de changement
Par Jacques Chevrier
Montréal: Les Éditions Logiques, 1994. 271 pages. ISBN 2-89381-241-4
RECENSÉ PAR ROLAND OUELLET, UNIVERSITÉ LAVAL
L’intention première de cette publication, comme on l’annonce à juste titre dans
l’introduction, est de “montrer comment la recherche en éducation peut être
source de changement, non seulement sur le plan de l’apprentissage, mais aussi
sur les plans de la politique, de l’administration, de l’intervention (enseignement
ou formation) et de l’activité même de recherche” (p. 11). Les textes qui sont
présentés dans ce collectif sont tirés d’un colloque tenu en mai 1993 à l’Université du Québec à Hull, colloque qui voulait amener les participants à réfléchir sur
l’impact social de la recherche en éducation.
Comme toute publication de ce genre, il faut s’attendre à des contributions
inégales, compte tenu que les communications ne répondent pas toujours et
nécessairement à un plan d’ensemble préalablement très défini et que chaque
présentateur possède une assez bonne latitude quant au contenu de sa communication. À ce sujet, on doit admettre qu’en général, la plupart des textes présentés
ici sont de qualibre équivalent et nous offrent des propos relativement consistants
et convergents.
La présente publication fait habilement la démonstration que l’impact social
de la recherche constitue une problématique complexe, renvoyant à la fois à la
question de la pertinence et de l’utilité de la recherche, mais aussi aux cadres
conceptuels utilisés, aux mécanismes de diffusion de la recherche, aux préjugés
et attentes que chercheurs et praticiens entretiennent les uns envers les autres,
aux rigidités des institutions de recherche et des organismes subventionnaires, à
la “turbulence” ou au dérangement qu’entraîment inévitablement dans un milieu
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donné la recherche qui y est menée (avec toutes les questions d’éthique que cela
soulève), aux changements que vivent les chercheurs eux-mêmes dans leurs
propres conceptions et façons de faire. On y montre aussi que l’impact social de
la recherche en éducation n’est pas sans limites, que plusieurs éléments y font
obstacle mais que diverses stratégies s’offrent aux chercheurs soucieux de mettre
en évidence la pertinence sociale, les répercussions pratiques et les contributions
directes des résultats de leur recherche. Enfin, des exemples concrets de recherches sont présentés pour illustrer comment certains changements sociaux ont été
l’aboutissement de diverses démarches de recherche.
On a choisi de diviser les présentations en deux sections. La première regroupant les contributions à la réflexion théorique alors que la seconde se voulait
“pratique,” axée sur le vécu de la recherche et destinée à illustrer les stratégies
proposées dans la section théorique. Cette division ne me semble pas toujours
pertinente dans la mesure où certains textes de la seconde partie présentent des
réflexions d’ordre théorique très articulées tout en établissant des ponts étroits
avec la pratique. Par ailleurs, on retrouve aussi, dans cette deuxième partie,
certains textes à saveur plutôt anecdotique, montrant que l’activité de recherche,
probablement comme toute activité humaine, ne se déroule pas toujours comme
prévu. Je note aussi au passage que la plupart des changements sociaux, qui sont
crédités au compte des recherches d’intervention figurant dans la deuxième
partie, reposent le plus souvent sur les impressions des chercheurs, leurs appréciations personnelles ou les perceptions des participants. L’espace manque ici
pour ouvrir un débat sur la question, mais on peut au moins soulever la question
de savoir jusqu’à quel point ces changements se sont effectivement produits. Que
des acteurs aient pris conscience de ceci ou cela, ou aient pris en charge tel ou
tel processus demeurent des phénomènes fort complexes qui ne sauraient être pris
pour acquis seulement parce qu’on l’affirme.
D’autre part, il faut souligner que si, dans l’ensemble, la plupart des textes
s’efforcent d’utiliser le style analytique, basé sur l’argumentation, la démonstration ou encore l’examen de la preuve, dans certains cas, le discours est plutôt
d’ordre normatif (du style “on devrait faire ceci, on devrait faire cela”). C’est
peut-être là un aspect qui finit par agacer le lecteur. Une autre remarque tient
aussi à la nature des recherches qui sont présentées dans la seconde partie. La
recherche-action est très nettement privilégiée et cela se comprend aisément
compte tenu de la thématique du colloque et des reproches dont font habituellement l’objet les recherches théoriques, fondamentales et même, à la rigueur, les
recherches quantitatives. Il aurait été intéressant que des partisans de ce type de
recherche puissent aussi exposer leurs points de vue sur la question, dans la
mesure où l’on peut considérer que la diffusion des résultats d’une recherche
et la discussion sur sa pertinence font partie intégrante de tout processus de
recherche.
Enfin, soulignons qu’un seul représentant du monde scolaire a fait connaître
son point de vue sur l’impact de la recherche en éducation; il reste qu’il aurait
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été tout à fait pertinent que les intervenants qui participent activement aux
différents processus des recherches collaboratives aient été invités, eux aussi, à
faire part de leurs réflexions. N’est-il pas paradoxal que sur les 22 auteurs que
compte cette publication, on en retrouve 19 issus du monde universitaire et aucun
de ceux du groupe des intervenants scolaires (enseignants, formateurs), que l’on
considère par ailleurs comme des “acteurs directs” dans le processus même des
recherches qui ont été menées (qu’elles soient de nature interactive, évaluative,
collaborative, recherche-action ou autre)? Une prise de parole de leur part aurait
sans doute permis de rapprocher davantage la recherche et la pratique, comme
le souhaitait cette publication dans l’un de ses objectifs (p. 16).
En conclusion, j’estime que cette publication pose des questions fondamentales
à tous ceux que la recherche en éducation intéresse: chercheurs, praticiens,
gestionnaires, politiciens. Le débat sur le changement provoqué par la recherche
en éducation est lancé et cette publication a le mérite de nous fournir une
réflexion articulée sur le sujet.
Historical Perspectives on Educational Policy in Canada: Issues, Debates and
Case Studies
Edited by Eric W. Ricker & B. Anne Wood
Toronto: Canadian Scholars’ Press, 1995. xvii+298 pages. ISBN 1-55130-045-1
(pbk.)
REVIEWED BY BRIAN TITLEY, UNIVERSITY OF LETHBRIDGE
This anthology contains 16 papers and commentaries selected from those (49 in
all) presented at the fourth biennial conference of the Canadian History of
Education Association in Halifax in October 1986. The editors attribute the nineyear hiatus between the conference and publication to “funding and technical
problems,” although they admit that preparation of the manuscript “proceeded
rather spasmodically over a number of years.” In fact, four of the papers featured
here have already appeared in other publications. And, in order to avoid further
delays, the editors did not ask contributors to revise their work.
Given these considerations, a reader might well expect a collection of tired
and dated material. But it is quite the opposite. Historical Perspectives contains
many pieces of enduring value — significant because of depth of research and
originality of conception. Indeed, the value of such pieces has become even more
apparent with the passing of time because the very issues they explicate continue
to trouble educators.
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Although the Halifax conference welcomed American, Australian, and British
scholars, only works by Canadians on mainly Canadian topics were chosen for
this book, the exception being Harold Silver’s keynote address. The conference
theme, educational policy, provides a unifying leitmotif to the book. In his
important introductory essay Eric Ricker surveys the major schools of interpretation that have shaped the writing of Canadian education history. Ricker also
examines the role played by historians in formulating educational policy and
concludes that decision makers have rarely consulted them or appreciated their
perspective. Harold Silver picks up this theme in “Policy Problems in Time.” In
arguing that history is under-used as a component of policy analysis, he asks
some probing questions about policy in the past with which historians should
grapple. His useful article suggests expanded research and teaching possibilities
for historians, especially for those who find themselves in reorganized “educational policy” departments.
At first glance, the section devoted to the 1984 polemic The Great Brain
Robbery may seem like old hat. In truth, it provides the liveliest reading in this
volume. The issues at stake — the nature and quality of higher education — are
as relevant as ever a decade later as budget cuts and the so-called “new realities”
force us to make difficult decisions. Although Jack Granatstein makes a spirited
defence of the book he co-wrote (and scores some telling points in doing so), he
is forced to admit that many of the allegations in Robbery were based on casual
observation rather than on empirical evidence. Paul Axelrod accuses Granatstein
and his collaborators of “romancing the past,” as nostalgic conservatives are
wont to do. He maintains that the past was far from the ideal it is imagined to
be, and that professors have always railed bitterly at a perceived mediocrity. In
a thoughtful and balancing commentary, Michael Cross takes Granatstein to task
for his elitist vision and challenges Axelrod to explore more fully the nature and
causes of the nostalgic conservatism he identifies.
In the next section Bruce Curtis examines the historical evolution of classroom
discipline, and Bob Gidney and Wyn Millar explore the idea of merit and its
connection with written examinations. Curtis, in his review of major British
books on education from 1580 to 1800, discovers that the advocacy of corporal
punishment declined over time, while “moral and emotional discipline” was
increasingly favoured. This change in the educational sphere, he suggests,
parallelled a development in the public sphere from overt to more subtle means
of control, a transformation accompanying the establishment of bourgeois
hegemony. The rise of the bourgeoisie is also a key element in the thesis put
forward by Gidney and Millar. The professional middle classes, they contend,
who owed their advancement to credentials and expertise, championed meritocratic examinations over patronage as criteria for access to status positions
because it served their own interests. Conceptually, these articles are among the
most interesting in the collection; the themes the authors develop deserve a much
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469
fuller treatment than the limitations of a conference paper allow. Even so, and
in spite of their obvious significance, at times I found myself wondering why
two articles based almost exclusively on British sources were included in a book
on Canadian education.
A section on church and state contains two essays which show the narrowminded and arrogant side of some Protestant educational endeavours. Réal
Boulianne focuses on the efforts of the Church of England to promote schools
under its own auspices in early 19th-century Lower Canada. He contends that the
church failed to achieve its objectives — to become the established church, to
proselytize Catholics, and to combat the influence of Methodism. And, on a
somewhat whiggish note, he berates the church for delaying the creation of a
modern school system. Michael Owen looks at Presbyterian missions to immigrant communities in early 20th-century Cape Breton, missions inspired by fear
that such communities posed a threat to the Canadian way of life. He notes that,
in spite of enormous evangelical and educational efforts, few immigrants actually
joined the church. Other less tangible measures of success, he admits, are hard
to find.
Reform policies are the concern of the next section. Played out against the
backdrop of the early 19th-century struggle for responsible government, William
Hamilton’s chapter shows how denominational rivalry and intransigence ensured
that higher education in Nova Scotia emerged in the fragmented form it retained
until recent attempts were made to rationalize it. James Love, after surveying the
agitation for free schools in each jurisdiction in the Canadas and the Maritimes,
claims, inter alia, that free schools only came into being with the advent of
reform administrations and an extended franchise which allowed the majority to
pass on the costs of education to the wealthy. A plausible idea, to be sure, but
no evidence is offered for it in the chapter.
Twentieth-century topics are presented by John Lyons and Nancy Sheehan in
the next section. Lyons’ chapter is, in effect, an historical tour d’horizon of
teachers’ work and status in Saskatchewan. An important point he makes along
the way is that university-based teacher education programs have done little to
advance the profession because they emphasize instructional strategies at the
expense of critical thinking. There is food for thought — and debate — here. I
must confess that the references to quilt-making and barn-raising in the title of
this piece still perplex me. Sheehan’s chapter on the effects of World War I on
educational policy is intriguing. The unbridled warmongering propaganda in the
schools and the none-too-subtle pressure on male teachers and senior students to
offer themselves up as cannon fodder are disturbing, if fascinating, to read about.
Sheehan asks if the war precipitated any fundamental changes to education in its
aftermath and concludes that it did not. The conflict ended on a note of selfcongratulation with officials praising the schools for their contribution. Why
would such a successful system need to change? This study could be profitably
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expanded in several directions: to French Canada, to the Second World War, and
to anti-war sentiment.
The final chapter in the book is J. D. Wilson’s piece on rural schooling in
British Columbia in the 1920s. Wilson offers an engaging portrait of school and
society from the teachers’ point of view — and a bleak and discouraging one it
is for the most part. He notes that most of these young professionals did not
intend to stay in their communities for very long and that historians must interpret their often negative remarks in this light. This is an excellent approach to
social history and Canadians will learn much about our past as scholars pursue
it even more.
I readily admit to serious suspicions that the theme of educational policy is
simply a flag of convenience to hang on this volume. But it would not be the
first time that an anthology lacked a coherent unifying principle. The strength of
the entire collection lies in the individual contributions rather than in whatever
glue binds them together. The generally first-rate scholarship is a tribute to the
vibrancy and relevance of historical research on education in Canada.
Les cheminements scolaires et l’insertion professionnelle des étudiants de
l’université: perspectives théoriques et méthodologiques
Sous la direction de Claude Trottier, Madeleine Perron et Miala Diambomba
Sainte-Foy: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 1995. 225 pages.
ISBN 2-7637-7388-5
RECENSÉ PAR YVON BOUCHARD, UNIVERSITÉ DU QUÉBEC À RIMOUSKI
Cet ouvrage rassemble la pensée de huit chercheurs autour de travaux présentés
lors d’un atelier portant sur les cheminements scolaires et l’insertion professionnelle des diplômés universitaires. Les divers textes sont précédés d’une
introduction faisant valoir l’émergence et la constitution du champ de recherche
sur l’insertion professionnelle et une conclusion tentant de recadrer les apports
divers par une nouvelle lecture de la réalité à l’aide de ces travaux et de quelques
écrits plus récents qui permettent de cerner de nouvelles pistes de recherche. Les
textes retenus s’intéressent à trois objets: un premier porte sur les perspectives
théoriques en sociologie et en économie de l’éducation; le second traite de
diverses perspectives d’analyse de la relation formation-emploi; tandis que le
dernier concerne les enjeux théoriques sous-jacents à des choix d’ordre méthodologique.
Comme c’est occasionnellement le cas pour des livres qui donnent suite à des
ateliers ou à des colloques, la qualité des textes réunis s’avère inégale et le temps
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écoulé entre les productions et la publication se révèle plus long qu’il ne serait
souhaitable. On est ici en présence de travaux dits théoriques ou méthodologiques. En fait, outre l’introduction, l’ouvrage débute par deux excellents textes
rédigés respectivement par Claude Trottier et Miala Diambomba qui tentent de
présenter les diverses approches relatives à la notion d’insertion professionnelle,
d’une part à partir de l’émergence et de la constitution du champ de recherche
lui-même selon des perspectives émanant de la sociologie de l’éducation et,
d’autre part, selon les développements récents et les nouvelles orientations qui
pointent relativement à la façon de constituer le champ, si bien sûr il existe.
Cette dernière tentative aborde le domaine surtout selon des perspectives économiques. À eux seuls, ces deux textes méritent l’attention qui doit être portée au
livre. On y trouve en peu de pages l’essentiel de l’évolution de ce secteur de
recherche tel qu’il se pose pour les chercheurs qui y investissent en faisant bien
ressortir les perspectives qui s’opposent et les difficultés reliées à la définition
du champ lui-même.
Les quatre articles qui s’insèrent entre le positionnement théorique et les
interrogations méthodologiques confrontent des problématiques particulières qui
touchent de près ou de loin au thème du livre sans fournir un matériel qu’on
souhaiterait plus développé et plus directement pertinent à l’avancement de la
connaissance dans le domaine de l’insertion professionnelle des étudiants universitaires. Le texte de Jean Vincens présente une perspective d’analyse systémique
qui vise les étudiants universitaires aussi bien que ceux d’autres ordres d’enseignement. L’idée que l’auteur soulève en parlant de système d’insertion professionnelle est appuyée par un discours où pensée formelle et idées reçues
cohabitent mais l’ensemble peut être retenu pour replacer un questionnement
relativement aux comportements de divers acteurs impliqués dans la relation.
L’analyse de Pierre Doray sur le point de vue des entreprises en regard de
l’insertion professionnelle des universitaires est fort pertinente pour compléter le
tour d’horizon souhaité par l’ouvrage. Toutefois, son contenu est probablement
trop vaste (quatre sujets différents et importants sont abordés de front) pour être
traité en quelques pages et ainsi nourrir la connaissance sur le plan théorique ou
méthodologique. Il est surprenant de voir par ailleurs un texte de nature polémique (rédigé par Gilles Paquet) inséré dans cet ouvrage. En fait, les idées
avancées sont fort pertinentes pour questionner le champ mais le ton et le style
employés pour le faire étonnent. L’auteur présente une pensée qui se démarque
de celle des autres autant sur le plan du contenu que sur celui de la démarche.
L’appel qui est fait à une révision des paradigmes de référence pour aborder
l’étude des cheminements professionnels et de l’insertion est tout à fait louable
et mériterait certes plus d’extension mais tel qu’inséré et développé, le plaidoyer
paraît un peu caduc. Le dernier document de ce groupe (Clément Lemelin) offre
une présentation pointue mais rigoureuse et soignée de la rentabilité des études
universitaires selon une perspective économique traditionnelle qui intéressera
sûrement celles et ceux qui partagent ce type de démarche.
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Les deux derniers textes retenus en fin d’ouvrage s’intéressent directement aux
perspectives méthodologiques soulevées par les études sur l’insertion professionnelle. Il s’agit probablement de l’aspect le plus faiblement développé dans ce
livre et qui laisse le plus le lecteur sur son appétit. Ni l’une ni l’autre des
perspectives présentées ne réussissent à nous convaincre de l’utilité et de la
pertinence de ces modes d’approche. La dichotomie quantitatif-qualitatif utilisée
pour aborder le sujet se comprend sur le plan d’une description des pratiques
dans le domaine. Par ailleurs, une argumentation plus fouillée des rapports entre
ces deux modes d’appropriation et d’analyse de données constitue certainement
une lacune que les textes utilisés pour décrire les perspectives méthodologiques
ne comblent pas.
Ce livre s’adresse indéniablement à des universitaires étudiants ou chercheurs
qui y trouveront sûrement un matériel fécond pour documenter plus avant un
champ de recherche encore trop peu investi par la littérature. Il s’avérera d’une
utilité limitée cependant pour les autres clientèles potentielles compte tenu de ses
intérêts plus théoriques que pragmatiques et des relations encore trop mal comprises et peu clarifiées par les chercheurs concernant les relations entre l’école
et le monde de l’emploi.
Sans enlever ses qualités à l’ouvrage, on doit convenir par ailleurs que les
références utilisées par les auteurs pour appuyer leurs écrits datent de quelques
années, ce qui se comprend par le temps encouru depuis la tenue de l’atelier à
l’origine de cette production et la publication officielle. Il faut ajouter aussi que
la présence de chercheurs de continents différents qui présentent des perspectives
propres aux pratiques de leurs milieux respectifs et aux modes d’organisations
locales sera d’une utilité limitée pour celles et ceux qui ne sont pas familiers
avec ces enjeux particuliers.
The Fifth Language: Learning a Living in the Computer Age
By Robert K. Logan
Toronto: Stoddart, 1995. 352 pages. ISBN 0-7737-2907-0 (hc.)
REVIEWED BY WILLIAM HIGGINSON, QUEEN’S UNIVERSITY
The American writer Edward Abbey once noted that, “In all of nature there is
no sound more pleasing than that of a hungry animal at its feed. Unless you are
the food.” In his new book, Robert Logan paints a positive picture of the recent
evolution and future prospects of the information technology “beast” and its very
healthy appetites. He does not dwell on the nature of its dietary preferences.
Early in his career at the University of Toronto, Logan became interested in
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the work of Marshall McLuhan and his colleagues at the Centre for Culture and
Technology. Logan has now emerged as one of the most active contemporary
members of what he calls “The Toronto School of Communications.” One of his
major tasks in The Fifth Language is to make a case for regarding recent innovations in digital technology, particularly the evolution of the Internet, as consistent
with the views that McLuhan articulated some three decades ago.
Logan is not the first to make this connection. Every month, on its masthead — the journal’s most sober page — Wired lists its “patron saint,” Marshall
McLuhan, complete with tiny photo and topical epigram (the offering in the
April 1996 issue reads, “Under electric technology, the entire business of man
becomes learning and knowing”). McLuhan has never been an easy thinker to
unravel and Logan’s exegesis of the origins and implications of his ideas is
exceptionally good. Certainly the netheads at Wired could learn a thing or two.
Their most recent efforts at bringing McLuhan to the infobahn masses, two
articles in the January 1996 issue, attracted caustic comments in letters to the
editor: “Not interesting. Not entertaining. Not informative”; “glib comments . . .
reveal shoddy research . . . a lamentable excuse for not reading his important
works.” Logan’s second chapter, “The Innis-McLuhan Communications Revolution: The Method in the Madness of Marshall McLuhan,” is, in contrast, both
interesting and informative.
The Fifth Language is an exceptionally ambitious work. Logan tackles in his
chapters themes that would require a series of monographs from more timid
scholars. Within the space of 150 pages, for example, he discusses “The Evolution of Language,” “The History of Education and Social Class,” and “Education,
Work and Computing.” In many ways, this broad-brush approach works well.
Logan’s ideas, like those of his mentor, are sweeping and panoramic. His title,
for example, is derived from his view that, “computing . . . represents a new
form of language . . . a system for both communications and informatics . . . part
of an evolutionary chain of languages which also includes speech, writing,
mathematics, and science” (p. 63).
Nevertheless, the reader is left with a great many gaps to fill. Logan’s efforts
at providing “minute particulars” are generally not compelling. It may well be
the case that the job description of individuals who used to be called secretaries
is now more accurately captured by the term “personal assistant.” It is also true
that these individuals find themselves called upon, on an ongoing basis, to do a
great deal of new learning. The vital question for the future, however, is whether
there will be any jobs of this sort, not what label to attach to them. Furthermore,
the “researcher visits the classroom” component of the “spreadsheet software”
section of the appendix on “The Computer as the Ideal Classroom Toolkit” (“a
lesson which lasted an hour and a half . . . we then played ‘spreadsheet bingo’
. . . the field trial was a success in that the pupils learned many things in a short
time” [pp. 316–317]) seems unlikely to convince the doubtful teacher of Logan’s
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claim that software of this sort is the key to a new and exciting approach to the
teaching and learning of science.
The rather distanced tone of The Fifth Language is not just a function of its
exceptionally broad range. It also reflects a conscious decision on the part of the
“Toronto School” to “articulate the patterns of change that occur as new media
create innovation and push out older forms without expressing a particular point
of view or making a moral judgment” (p. 25). Whether such a stance is actually
possible, let alone desirable, in a book on the future of education seems moot.
Be that as it may, readers owe Logan a vote of thanks for his unusual and
provocative book. Canadian students would be well served if their teachers were
to address seriously the many challenges offered by this stimulating and important piece of scholarship.
Private Readings in Public: Schooling the Literary Imagination
By Dennis J. Sumara
New York: Peter Lang, 1996. xv+305 pages. ISBN 0-8204-3028-5 (pbk.)
REVIEWED BY TREVOR J. GAMBELL, UNIVERSITY OF SASKATCHEWAN
Dennis Sumara’s book is as vast, looming, and promising as the prairie sky. It
begins where most books on reader-response theory and pedagogy end, with
classroom and student response and with the role of the teacher in that response.
Sumara criticizes current reading and response theory and practice because
they situate the literary experience in classrooms, engendering what he calls a
“schooled” response that ignores the lived or out-of-classroom experiences of not
just students but also their teachers. His thesis is that reading, curriculum, and
the lives of those who experience them are inextricable. Any understanding of
literary response should embrace the lived experiences of readers as well as the
created or recreated experiences contained in the text. Because each literary
experience is different, the unfolding of the process is a matter of “laying down
a path, while walking,” to quote the title of Sumara’s sixth chapter.
Sumara’s book is a series of interpretations that have helped him to understand
the specificity of the event of shared reading in public schools. He relies on
various classroom and shared reading experiences, his own and those of others,
to bring together vistas of both theory and situated practice to provide a panorama of literary understanding. The research and interpretations presented in this
book are informed by the author’s reading of hermeneutics, literary theory,
curriculum theory, and postmodernism. Each chapter is meant to show the
evolution of the author’s thinking as supported by various reading and research
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experiences. Those experiences include reading Katherine Paterson’s novel
Bridge to Teribithia with his Grade 7 students; a teacher’s reading of William
Bell’s Forbidden City to her high school class and the students’ responses to that
novel; a teachers’ reading group, which included the author, who read and met
regularly to discuss Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient; and classroom
observations of high school literature classes led by teachers who made up the
reading group.
When I read Sumara’s intention for the book I wondered how he would draw
together these vastly different perspectives. To me as reader the exercise seemed
one of searching for a soaring hawk in the immense azure prairie sky. But the
author kept to his word; the book unfolds chapter by chapter, and the vision is
created window by hermeneutic window. The images and metaphors he invokes
to create a schooled literary imagination enable both the writer and the reader;
I came to realize at the end of Chapter 7 that the book offers the literate and
literary reader a means of interpreting the events of the literature classroom
rather than a way of teaching. The author takes for granted that readers know
reader-response theory and are critical of their own classroom practices.
Consequently, his book takes literature teachers well beyond reader-response
theory and practice; it is not for the uninitiated.
In Chapter 2, Sumara discusses various theories, descriptions, and definitions
of literature and reading literature — and through each of these theories explores
students’ readings of The Forbidden City. The next chapter takes the reader into
the realm of hermeneutics, where Sumara relies on Barthes, Gadamer, Iser,
Kristeva, Merleau-Ponty, Ong, and Sartre, to explore readers’ developing
relationship with Ondaatje’s The English Patient. Then, in Chapter 4, the
interpretive vista expands yet further when Sumara turns to evolutionary theory
to explain the interrelationships between organisms (people, readers) and their
environments (texts) through “structural coupling,” the ongoing dialectic between
living entities and their environment wherein each simultaneously determines the
other. At this point Sumara selects from human cognitive theory the concept of
“embodied action,” and takes from The English Patient the metaphor of
“unskinning,” which becomes a dominant theme in Sumara’s book. By
unskinning, teachers can encourage students, and undertake themselves, to peel
back the layers of meaning which hide private meanings in public forums such
as classrooms, and which impede response as lived experience.
The next two chapters explore how a world of understanding develops; in
Chapter 5 the author draws upon hermeneutic imagination to investigate the
group’s shared reading of The English Patient. He examines six hermeneutic
“windows” of understanding in both this and Chapter 6, the latter based on
experiences of students reading and responding to texts in school.
But it is the seventh and final chapter that allowed me to see the hawk in that
everlasting hermeneutic sky, for here Sumara describes his own lived experience,
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all those aspects of life and living that experientially make their way into and
through his writing and reading. He discovers why he reads fiction: “We don’t
just read to add new knowledge or experiences to our lives, we read in order to
find a location to re-interpret past experiences in relation to present and projected
experiences” (p. 239). Sumara discovers too the meaning of curriculum, “an
intertwining of mutually specifying relations among students, texts, teachers, and
contexts” (p. 242). Perhaps “re-discover” rather than “discover” is the right word,
because the sense of ongoing and relational interpretation is the wholistic basis
of Sumara’s literary imagination.
Private Readings in Public demands careful reading. It asks readers to step
beyond conventional literary theory and pedagogic orthodoxy, to reflect on their
own and their students’ responses to literary texts, and to explore the possibilities
of private readings and public readings in the schooled literature environment.
Sumara’s volume places English literature and literary theory and research at the
forefront of intertextual and hermeneutic enquiry.
Eduquer et punir: généalogie du discours psychologique
Par Eirick Prairat
Nancy: Presses universitaires de Nancy, collection Forum de L’IFRAS, 1994.
300 pages. ISBN 2-86480-910-9
RECENSÉ PAR NATHALIE BÉLANGER, ÉTUDIANTE AU DOCTORAT EN SOCIOLOGIE DE
L’ÉDUCATION, UNIVERSITÉ PARIS V
Dans cet ouvrage composé de cinq parties, lesquelles sont sous-divisées en de
nombreux chapitres, Eirick Prairat retrace minutieusement les pratiques punitives
des petites écoles et collèges de France du 16e siècle au 19e siècle. Ce travail
tente de comprendre la césure qui s’opère dans l’administration de la punition
avec le siècle classique. La documentation, point fort de ce livre, permettra aux
chercheurs et aux enseignants d’y trouver un nombre impressionnant de citations
et d’exemples.
La question que se pose Eirick Prairat se formule de la façon suivante:
“Comment les formes d’assujettissements et les schémas de connaissance se
sont-ils appelés et impliqués au coeur de l’espace pédagogique?” Comment, pour
le dire autrement, la mutation “disciplinaro-pédagogique” des 16e et 17e siècles,
dont la principale caractéristique est cette mise en ordre de l’école, s’est-elle
opérée et quelles en sont les traces; comment la discipline qui avait comme
principale fonction d’extirper le mal est-elle devenue l’adjuvant certain de la
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pédagogie? Pour répondre à cette question, l’auteur recourt à toute la panoplie
des traités de pédagogie allant de celui de Rabelais à Maria Edgeworth, en
passant par ceux de Démia, Erasme, de Batencour, de La Salle. Il consulte aussi
des ouvrages littéraires qui permettent de mettre en relief, de nuancer, selon une
certaine trame historique, les préceptes disciplinaires annoncés dans les traités.
La vie de l’écolier telle que la relate Balzac ou Voltaire, dans certaines parties
de leurs oeuvres, nous conduira alors de l’autre côté du miroir, du point de vue
de l’enfant puni.
Le recensement des pratiques punitives que réalise Eirick Prairat ne se présente pas uniquement sous la forme de catégories “faites choses,” mais aussi
selon une “histoire faite corps.” On aura reconnu ici l’inspiration foucaldienne.
L’auteur cherche ainsi les pratiques que recouvrent les discours car, comme le
dit Paul Veyne en parlant de l’histoire selon Michel Foucault, les “mots nous
abusent, nous font croire à l’existence de choses, d’objets naturels, (. . .) alors
que ces choses ne sont que le corrélat des pratiques correspondantes.”1 C’est en
adoptant cet ancrage théorique que notre auteur identifie “les figures du corps
puni”: la punition-expiation, la punition-signe, la punition-exercice et la punitionbannissement. L’auteur s’intéresse à la nature de la punition d’autrefois et à ce
qui la légitimait. Il s’agit de comprendre les motifs coupables qui entraînent la
réprimande, les raisons profondes qui poussent à punir, par exemple, celui qui
“se gratasse pendant les prières” (p. 83)!
Il va sans dire que l’administration de la punition suivait tout un cérémonial:
la fustigation devait avoir lieu devant tous les autres élèves “pour l’exemple et
pour inspirer la terreur” (p. 101); le maître ne devait punir sous les feux de la
colère; quelques fois le châtiment devait être préalablement médité par l’élève
rebelle. Balzac verra dans ces préparatifs au châtiment un double supplice qui
assigne bel et bien à l’enfant un statut de dépendance et de soumission à l’égard
du maître. Par là, il est possible de soutenir l’hypothèse d’un recouvrement des
discours disciplinaire et pédagogique. La punition singulière devient une occasion
pour moraliser tout le groupe d’enfants.
On ne peut faire autrement que de s’arrêter plus longuement sur le trop bref
chapitre intitulé “Corps puni, corps épargné, corps rebelle” qui constitue, à mon
avis, une approche résolument nouvelle en ce qui concerne l’étude historique des
phénomènes disciplinaires. Aux pages 116 à 121, Prairat montre en effet que
l’élève peut donner un autre sens à la punition qu’on lui impose. Il peut toujours
s’évader avec la force de son imagination! Il peut aussi résister, alors la punition
n’a guère d’effet: “Les écoliers mis en cage tombaient sous l’oeil sévère du
préfet, espèce de censeur qui venait, à ses heures ou à l’improviste, d’un pas
léger, pour savoir si nous causions au lieu de faire nos pensums. Mais les
coquilles de noix semées dans les escaliers, ou la délicatesse de notre ouïe, nous
permettaient presque toujours de prévoir son arrivée,2 nous raconte Balzac. Quant
à Maxime Du Camp, il révèle que son premier souci après avoir été enfermé
était d’examiner attentivement la prison afin de reconnaître les moyens qu’elle
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offrait d’échapper à l’ennui. Il y reconnaissait assez vite quelque fente par
laquelle il pouvait communiquer avec un voisin de cellule. La punition pouvait
même quelques fois être considérée comme une conséquence inéluctable après
un doux moment d’azur. Les profondeurs du pire cachot scolaire ne sauraient,
dans pareil cas, faire oublier le moment d’évasion.
Il est donc tout à fait à propos de parler, comme le suggère Balzac, de “lutte
continuelle” pour décrire la relation éducative entre le maître et l’élève. Seule
une maîtrise des effets de pouvoir et de savoir permettra de moins punir et de
mieux punir. C’est en sériant les écoliers, en suspendant la parole, en créant un
régime de visibilité (le travail des officiers scolaires rapporteurs, par exemple)
que s’installera progressivement cette pédagogie de l’ordonnancement qui
préviendra, du même coup, les occasions de punir. Tout un savoir, que l’on
pourrait presque qualifier de pré-psychologique, se mettra en place. Avec de
Batencour, au 17e siècle, les nouveaux venus ne seront pas d’emblée intégrés à
la classe: il leurs est d’abord réservé un banc “commode de la vëue du maistre”
(commode de la vue du maître) à partir duquel ils pourront être observés (p.
240). Le maître cherche ainsi à établir un jugement sur chaque enfant. Des
enquêtes auprès des parents permettront même de s’enquérir des habitudes, des
humeurs et des moeurs du nouveau venu. Mieux connaître l’enfant pour moins
ou mieux le punir semble être le but fondamental de ce dispositif disciplinaropédagogique qui se met progressivement en place à partir du 16e siècle.
Alors commencent à s’accumuler ces discours à la frontière du bon sens et du
philosophique que le 20e siècle s’appropriera comme discours psychologiques.
Toute la pratique éducative s’en ressentira. Le maître devra savoir pardonner les
fautes, tolérer les défauts d’attention et punir la malice. Mais laissons la parole
à l’auteur pour finir:
Ce n’est pas une disposition éthique mais un savoir psychologique sur l’enfant qui commande cette nouvelle tolérance, et il a fallu ce savoir pour que la faute se différencie en
échec, erreur et autre inadvertance; pour que la faute volontaire et maligne cède du terrain
et que s’instaure une brisure dans l’histoire des discours éducatifs. Ce savoir disqualifie
dorénavant la punition, considérée davantage comme l’expédient d’un maître ignorant du
monde de l’enfance que comme le moyen adéquat d’une thérapie morale. (p. 269)
NOTES
1
P. Veyne, “Foucault révolutionne l’histoire,” dans Comment on écrit l’histoire (Paris: Seuil, 1978).
Dans le même ouvrage, Veyne décrit fort bien la méthode historique de Foucault:
Expliquer et expliciter l’histoire consiste à l’apercevoir d’abord tout entière, à rapporter les
prétendus objets naturels aux pratiques datées et rares qui les objectivisent et à expliquer ces
pratiques, non à partir d’un moteur unique, mais à partir de toutes les pratiques voisines sur
lesquelles elles s’ancrent. (p. 241)
L’historien est alors invité à défaire ces “prétendus objets naturels” qui vont de soi pour comprendre comment ils ont été objectivés.
2
L’auteur cite: Honoré de Balzac, Louis Lambert (Folio Gallimard, 1980), p. 69.
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Taking Stock: Canadian Studies in the Nineties
By David Cameron
Montreal: Association for Canadian Studies, 1996. xvii+238 pages.
ISBN 0-919363-34-2 (pbk.)
REVIEWED BY ROBERT M. STAMP, UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY
First, a declaration of interest. From 1980–1983, I coordinated the Canadian
Studies Program at the University of Calgary. At that time, all fledgling Canadian studies programs and their coordinators confronted a host of start-up
problems, mostly tactical in nature.
Should we have lobbied for majors or minors or honours programs? Disciplinary or interdisciplinary approaches? Dispersed programs scattered among several
departments in humanities and social sciences or centralized programs independent of discipline-oriented departments? How vigorously should we have
pushed multidisciplinary or transdisciplinary approaches? Separate academic
appointments, or faculty seconded part-time from history, literature, and political
science?
Fifteen years later, we have the aptly-titled Taking Stock: Canadian Studies
in the Nineties, a study commissioned by the Department of the Secretary of
State and written by David Cameron. Taking Stock is set against a rather depressing background of events. During the six-year gestation period between the
study’s commissioning and its publication, the Department of the Secretary of
State was itself transformed into the Department of Canadian Heritage, while
across the country Canadian studies programs faced the threat of elimination in
the latest round of savage cutbacks within the academic community.
Taking Stock concentrates on Canadian studies in Canadian universities,
documenting the numbers of courses in which Canadian content is “significant,”
“partial,” or “none”; counting course enrollees, graduate theses, and countryof-origin of faculty members (coming dangerously close to Jacques Parizeau’s
alleged comments on what constitutes a pure-wool Québécois); measuring
CanCon and CanCult in every conceivable manner. The report also examines
community colleges, key organizations in Canadian studies, government agencies,
archival activities, and print and non-print resources. It is a goodly catalogue.
Cameron clearly delineates the dilemma of Canadian studies:
Most people interviewed . . . believed that Canada is, if anything, less united, less capable
of forming a coherent national purpose and less willing to know and celebrate itself than
it was fifteen or twenty years ago . . . Yet most people also contended that Canadian
studies had made substantial strides during the same period. (p. 31)
480
RECENSIONS
/
BOOK REVIEWS
In other words, Canadian studies seems to have served neither a citizenship nor
a self-knowledge rationale. Canadian studies programs and personnel played little
significant role in the Canada 125 celebrations of 1992; both the structures and
the players seem to have fallen out of educational and intellectual fashion (p. 86).
The author is not short of proposals for improving the situation. Support only
the stronger Canadian studies programs and phase out the weaker ones; consider
axing interdisciplinary programs in favour of Canadian-content courses within
existing departments; enlist more student, corporate, and community support;
popularize Canadian studies through partnerships with agencies like the CRB
Foundation (and get even more of those delightful Heritage Minutes on television!).
Unfortunately, most of Cameron’s recommendations are tactical rather than
strategic in nature. He fails to take up the larger questions that could chart
Canadian studies through the next decade.
Why, for example, is there is more support for Canadian studies abroad than
at home — $4 million from the Department of External Affairs alone! The International Council for Canadian Studies (ICCS) thrives, with member societies in
some 15 foreign countries, while the Association for Canadian Studies (ACS)
limps along at home. Can Canadians learn something about themselves from
others? This study, however, never really confronts the “other.” North American
and international forces are simply defined as part of the American challenge.
(Note the use of the word “challenge,” not “opportunity.”) How might Canadian
studies programs address the North American Free Trade Agreement and the
global economy?
Other important strategic questions, and many additional tactical questions, are
left unanswered. What relationship should exist between the universality of
knowledge and the specificity of Canadian studies? In this land of Harold Innis
and Marshall McLuhan, how should Canadian studies programs use distance
education and the internet? What can Canadian studies learn from Women’s
studies and Native studies, and why do certain interdisciplinary programs thrive
and others falter? What relationship might exist between Canadian studies
programs in schools and those in universities?
Meanwhile, the University of Calgary’s Canadian Studies Program, now under
different and enlightened leadership, earns praise in this report for its “strong and
vigorous” approach, and is considered “one of the largest and most active programs in the country” (p. 82). Tell us about it. What is its secret?
Index du volume 21 /
Index to volume 21*
Articles
Auger, Réjean et Serge P. Séguin. Validité globale d’une stratégie de testing
adaptatif de maîtrise pour fins de certification scolaire au Québec, 143.
Bascia, Nina. Teacher Leadership: Contending with Adversity, 155.
Bercier-Larivière, Micheline. Voir Forgette-Giroux, Renée, Marielle Simon et
Micheline Bercier-Larivière.
Bouchard, Pierrette et Jean-Claude St-Amant. Le retour aux études: les facteurs de
réussite dans quatre écoles spécialisées au Québec, 1.
Conway, David. See Fleming, Thomas & David Conway.
Corson, David. Official-Language Minority and Aboriginal First-Language Education: Implications of Norway’s Sámi Language Act for Canada, 84.
Coulter, Rebecca Priegert. Gender Equity and Schooling: Linking Research and
Policy, 433.
Cumming-Potvin, Wendy. Voir McAndrew, Marie, Anne St-Pierre et Wendy
Cumming-Potvin.
Dagenais, Lucie France. Description des approches d’égalité entre les sexes en
éducation dans les provinces canadiennes, 241.
Dei, George J. Sefa. The Role of Afrocentricity in the Inclusive Curriculum in
Canadian Schools, 170.
Dickinson, Greg M., & W. Rod Dolmage. Education, Religion, and the Courts in
Ontario, 363.
Dolmage, W. Rod. See Dickinson, Greg M. & W. Rod Dolmage.
Dufresne-Tassé, Colette et Christian Savard. Le questionnement de l’adulte au
musée et les obstacles à sa progression, 280.
Fleming, Thomas, & David Conway. Setting Standards in the West: C. B. Conway, Science, and School Reform in British Columbia, 1938–1974, 294.
Forgette-Giroux, Renée, Marielle Simon et Micheline Bercier-Larivière. Les
pratiques d’évaluation des apprentissages en salle de classe: perceptions des
enseignantes et des enseignants, 384.
Gérin-Lajoie, Diane. L’innovation scolaire: deux expériences en milieu francoontarien, 318.
Hensler, Hélène. Voir Louis, Roland, France Jutras et Hélène Hensler.
Hughes, Andrew S. See Sears, Alan M., & Andrew S. Hughes.
Jutras, France. Voir Louis, Roland, France Jutras et Hélène Hensler.
*
Références aux numéros du volume/Key to pagination: (1) 1–122; (2) 123–240; (3) 241–362; (4)
363–484.
481
21, 4 (1996)
482
INDEX DU VOLUME
21 /
INDEX TO VOLUME
21
Krugly-Smolska, Eva. See Maxwell, Mary Percival, James D. Maxwell, & Eva
Krugly-Smolska.
Louis, Roland, France Jutras et Hélène Hensler. Des objectifs aux compétences:
implications pour l’évaluation de la formation initiale des maîtres, 414.
Luce-Kapler, Rebecca. See Sumara, Dennis J., & Rebecca Luce-Kapler.
Maxwell, James D. See Maxwell, Mary Percival, James D. Maxwell, & Eva
Krugly-Smolska.
Maxwell, Mary Percival, James D. Maxwell, & Eva Krugly-Smolska. Ethnicity,
Gender, and Occupational Choice in Two Toronto Schools, 257.
Maxwell, T. W. Accountability: The Case of Accreditation of British Columbia’s
Public Schools, 18.
McAndrew, Marie, Anne St-Pierre et Wendy Cumming-Potvin. Le technicien en
assistance sociale affecté à la prévention de l’abandon scolaire, 35.
Nagy, Philip. International Comparisons of Student Achievement in Mathematics
and Science: A Canadian Perspective, 396.
Savard, Christian. Voir Dufresne-Tassé, Colette et Christian Savard.
Sears, Alan M., & Andrew S. Hughes. Citizenship Education and Current
Educational Reform, 123.
Séguin, Serge P. Voir Auger, Réjean et Serge P. Séguin.
Simon, Marielle. Voir Forgette-Giroux, Renée, Marielle Simon et Micheline
Bercier-Larivière.
St-Amant, Jean-Claude. Voir Bouchard, Pierrette et Jean-Claude St-Amant.
St-Pierre, Anne. Voir McAndrew, Marie, Anne St-Pierre et Wendy CummingPotvin.
Sumara, Dennis J., & Rebecca Luce-Kapler. (Un)Becoming a Teacher: Negotiating
Identities While Learning to Teach, 65.
Walker, Keith D. The Canadian Copyright Law and Common Educational
Practices, 50.
Discussion Notes / Débat
Murray, Harry G. Review of an Educational Psychology Textbook as Kitsch:
Reconstructing Woolfolk, 200.
Sanders, James T. The Educational Psychology Text as Kitsch: Deconstructing
Woolfolk, 187.
Sanders, James T. Pics, Props, and Politics: A Reply to Murray and Smith, 203.
Smith, Howard A. Is Woolfolk Kitsch? The Sizzle and the Steak, 194.
Essais critiques / Review Essays
Daniels, LeRoi B. Schoolyard Bullies or Schoolyard Bimbos? (Schoolyard Bullies:
Messing with British Columbia’s Education System, by Mike Crawley), 341.
INDEX DU VOLUME
21 /
INDEX TO VOLUME
21
483
de Castell, Suzanne. Funny, This Doesn’t Read Like Educational Theory (“That’s
Funny, You Don’t Look Like a Teacher”: Interrogating Images and Identity in
Popular Culture, by Sandra Weber & Claudia Mitchell), 458.
Kehoe, John. Racism in Canadian Schools: Untested Assumptions (Racism in
Canadian Schools, edited by Ibrahim Alladin), 453.
Kymlicka, B. B. Edufantasy: Educational Administration Today (Outstanding
School Administrators: Their Keys to Success, by Frederick C. Wendel, Fred A.
Hoke, & Ronald G. Joekel; Leadership for the Schoolhouse: How is it
Different? Why is it Important? by Thomas J. Sergiovanni), 333.
Tardif, Maurice. Sociologie de l’expérience par François Dubet, 207.
Allard, Michel. Le séminaire de Québec de 1800 à 1850 par Noël Baillargeon,
346.
Baillargeon, Normand. L’éducation et les musées: visiter, explorer et apprendre
sous la direction de Bernard Lefebvre, 353.
Barbeau, Colette. L’activité éducative, une théorie, une pratique: l’animation de
la vie de la classe par Pierre Angers et Colette Bouchard, 108.
Beagan, Brenda L. Without a Word: Teaching Beyond Women’s Silence, by Magda
Gere Lewis, 111.
Bélanger, Nathalie. Eduquer et punir: généalogie du discours psychologique par
Eirick Prairat, 476.
Bouchard, Yvon. Les cheminements scolaires et l’insertion professionnelle des
étudiants de l’université: perspectives théoriques et méthodologiques sous la
direction de Claude Trottier, Madeleine Perron et Miala Diambomba, 470.
Brochu, Claire. Le parent entraîneur par Claire Leduc, 110.
Cacouault-Bitaud, Marlaine. La gestion en éducation, une affaire d’hommes ou de
femmes? par Claudine Baudoux, 232.
Coombs, Jerrold R. Beyond Liberation and Excellence: Reconstructing the Public
Discourse on Education, by David E. Purpel & Svi Shapiro, 463.
Coulter, Rebecca Priegert. Anti-Racism, Feminism and Critical Approaches to
Education, edited by Roxana Ng, Pat Staton, & Joyce Scane, 219.
de Grandpré, Marcel. La créativité des aînés: le paradoxe de l’avenir par MarieClaire Landry, 105.
Dolmage, W. Rod. Equal Educational Opportunity for Students with Disabilities:
Legislative Action in Canada, by W. J. Smith, 236.
Fitznor, Laara. Taking Control: Power and Contradiction in First Nations Adult
Education, by Celia Haig-Brown, 226.
Gambell, Trevor J. Private Readings in Public: Schooling the Literary
Imagination, by Dennis J. Sumara, 474.
Higginson, William. The Fifth Language: Learning a Living in the Computer Age,
by Robert K. Logan, 472.
484
INDEX DU VOLUME
21 /
INDEX TO VOLUME
21
Laing, Donald. Dethroning Classics and Inventing English: Liberal Education and
Culture in Nineteenth-Century Ontario, by Garth R. Lambert, 351.
Laliberté, G-Raymond. Une école de son temps: un horizon démocratique pour
l’école et le collège par Jocelyn Berthelot, 227.
Laperrière, Guy. Histoire de l’Université Laval: les péripéties d’une idée par Jean
Hamelin, 348.
Lebrun, Monique. Un siècle de formation des maîtres au Québec, 1836–1939 par
Thérèse Hamel, 119.
Legault, Lise. La pensée et les émotions en mathématiques: métacognition et
affectivité par Louise Lafortune et Lise St-Pierre, 106.
Levin, Benjamin. Women and Leadership in Canadian Education, edited by
Cecilia Reynolds & Beth Young, 117.
Maguire, T. O. Equity in Mathematics Education: Influences of Feminism and
Culture, edited by Pat Rogers & Gabriele Kaiser, 360.
Maxwell, Mary Percival. Old Boys: The Powerful Legacy of Upper Canada
College, by James Fitzgerald, 107.
McNay, Margaret. Teachers Who Teach Teachers: Reflections on Teacher
Education, edited by Tom Russell & Fred Korthagen, 358.
O’Leary, Paul. Work, Education and Leadership: Essays in the Philosophy of
Education, by V. A. Howard & Israel Scheffler, 355.
Ouellet, Roland. La recherche en éducation comme source de changement par
Jacques Chevrier, 465.
Parent, Ghyslain. L’éducation intégrée à la communauté en déficience
intellectuelle par L. Saint-Laurent, 221.
Pearson, Allen T. The Spirit of Teaching Excellence, edited by David C. Jones,
222.
Potvin, Pierre. Décrochage scolaire, décrochage technique: la prospérité en péril
sous la direction de Denyse Côté, Gilles Paquet et Jean-Pascal Souque, 224.
Raphael, Dennis. Assessing Students in Classrooms and Schools, by Robert J.
Wilson, 230.
Rooke, Patricia T. Children, Teachers and Schools in the History of British
Columbia, edited by Jean Barman, Neil Sutherland, & J. Donald Wilson, 234.
Sanders, James T. The End of Education: Redefining the Value of School, by Neil
Postman, 238.
Sorin, Noëlle. Pour que vive la lecture: littérature et bibliothèques de jeunesse
sous la direction de Hélène Charbonneau, 115.
Stamp, Robert M. Taking Stock: Canadian Studies in the Nineties, by David
Cameron, 479.
Stewart, Douglas. Children, Philosophy, and Democracy, edited by John P. Portelli
& Ronald Reed, 356.
Titley, Brian. Historical Perspectives on Educational Policy in Canada: Issues,
Debates and Case Studies, edited by Eric W. Ricker & B. Anne Wood, 467.

CJE Vol. 21, No. 4

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