Reflection 2

Darryl Leroux.   3360                              Reflection # 2                                       Harry Reddin

 

“Mayday. Mayday”.

Afro-Centric Schools in Ontario

Afro-Centric schools are a step in the right direction but at the same time are correctly described as a knee jerk reaction to the real underlying issue of the systematic breakdown of curriculum in the Canadian public school system.  Although the Afro-centric school undoubtedly causes a divisional rift among ethnic groups, the media and pop-culture incorrectly sensationalize this school system using powerful words such as ‘segregation’ , dangerously  digging up bones from the past that carry negative connotations with them.   The quick fix of these Afro-Centric schools is not enough; it is merely a band aid solution that doesn’t hold the school boards accountable for the last 30 years of neglect.  It is commendable that the Afro-Centric ethnicity has taken matters into their own hands but the Afro-Centric school falls short of getting to the structural damage caused by curriculum failures and stand out as individuals and misfits that go against the grain of Canada’s multicultural identity.
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A more holistic approach is needed to pick up the pieces from school boards that have been asleep at the wheel driving the Canadian public school system down a road of disrepair. The quantitative data doesn’t lie, it is not only the African students who are in dire need of a life preserver; Portuguese students nose out the black students with a 43 percent dropout rate, whereas Spanish students aren’t far behind in the high 30^th percentile. (Afro-Centric School  Debate Video notes, {not posted on Blackboard} ) These numbers prove that as individual ethnicities need to come together vice going it alone, to combat the ill effects of underachievement and come up with a plan of action for effectively teaching these diverse youth.   

I’m not against specialized curricula, but having separate schools for blacks or other ethnic students is as offensive as white-only washrooms.  This is an example of a more extreme anti Afro-Centric statement from advocate journalist Jan Wong (2011), where she cries ‘educational apartheid’ when debating this concept. (p. 1).  Wong also states there are too few studies that clearly demonstrated the effectiveness of Afro-Centric schools.  This is a crucial flaw and it is anti-Canadian how these Afro-Centric schools segregate along racial lines. These schools are setting a precedent that will not only further compound the underlying issues and using Wong’s adjective, be ‘antithetical’ to the pillars preached across the Canadians school system which are openness, integration and cohesion.

Community is defined as social group whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often have a common cultural and historical heritage.  This definition is the common theme within debates over Afro-Centric schools and central to help learners build their self-, collective, and cultural identities within an environment of social excellence. (George Dei., 2008, p.346.)  This statement is synonymous with the idea of the African based school system but not with the current Eurocentric Community that holds a majority seat in Canada today. It comes down to the word community and what your definition of community consists of.  Multiculturalism is basis for Canadian society today and if institutions such as schools begin to focus on individual ethnicities it is difficult to be construed as cohesion.

In conclusion, Afro-Centric schools are a life preserver that is being offered up by one of many ethnic groups struggling in the stormy seas of Canada’s public school system.  Without the support of a much larger rescue craft that has to come in the form of a major overhaul of curriculum, the current state of the Canadian public schools will soon move from individual “Mayday” calls to something much worse.  Call them what you want: at risk students, disadvantaged or special needs, the fact remains that these students are not individuals, they are Canadians.  We must work as one community as our Canadian citizenship dictates and bond together before our sinking school system is lost at sea.

References

       Dei, George. (2008). Schooling as Community. Journal of Black Studies. Vol 38 (3), 346-366

Wong, Jan. (2011) Why educational apartheid is not the answer to curbing dropout rates for specific racial and ethnic groups. Toronto Life.  

http://www.torontolife.com/daily/informer/from-print-edition-informer/2011/05/31/why-educational-apartheid-is-not-the-answer-to-curbing-dropout-rates-for-specific-racial-and-ethnic-groups/

You-tube video debate Afro-Centric Schools-Ontario-Class Notes