By Ryan Cormier and Gavin Taylor
The image is familiar: rows of students sitting at desks, busily scribbling in their exam booklets.
But soon the students might not be students at all. Under new legislation Ontario’s teachers may be the ones writing the tests.
On June 28, the provincial legislature passed the Stability and Excellence in Education Act, making professional development courses mandatory for public school teachers. All teachers must take 14 courses every five years to retain their certification to teach. To pass, teachers must undergo some form of assessment.
A second bill, tabled Oct. 15, also requires evaluation of their performance in the classroom. Principals and vice-principals will do this every three years. New teachers will be evaluated once a year in their first two years.
These are the latest in a series of educational reforms introduced by Ontario’s Conservative government since 1995. These measures have ranged from the introduction of province-wide literacy tests to the drafting of new guidelines for student discipline.
The reforms are inspired by a widespread perception that Ontario’s public school system has gone astray.
Many cite the province’s dismal performance in international tests as evidence of the schools’ ailing health.
In 1991, 13-year-olds from Ontario scored lower in the International Assessment of Educational Progress, an international math and science test, than students of any other Canadian province. In subsequent tests, Ontario’s students have scored below the national average in subjects ranging from literacy to geography.
Some reformers blame these low scores on the “child-centred” style of teaching that has held sway in the province since the late 1960s. Advocated by a liberal-leaning commission chaired by Emmett Hall and Lloyd Dennis between 1965 and 1968, child-centred teaching encourages students to learn at their own pace, giving them free rein to develop their talents. This approach was a reaction against the traditional, regimented style of rote learning.
But to many critics, child-centered learning has promoted mediocrity and a lack of standards. Parents complain about inconsistent grading, lack of discipline, and weak literacy skills.
In a 1993 article, one mother told the Toronto Star that a teacher advised her not to worry about her son’s poor spelling because he would be smart enough to hire a secretary.
Faced with this public outcry, Bob Rae’s one-term NDP government appointed the Royal Commission on Learning in 1993. The commission’s 1995 report recommended standardized student testing and raised the possibility of teacher testing.
The Royal Commission’s findings dovetailed with the goals of Mike Harris’s Common Sense Revolution, which sought greater accountability in public services. Teacher testing, the Conservatives contend, will serve the ends of both professional development and public accountability.
“Our new teacher testing program will assure parents, students and taxpayers that all Ontario teachers are continually improving and sharpening their skills,” said Education Minister Janet Ecker in a Sept. 27 press release.
The program appears to be popular with the public. A 2000 poll by the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto found that 86% of Ontarians supported qualifying tests for new public school teachers.
Parents at a recent meeting at Centretown’s Glashen School supported the new program, largely because it addresses their worries that their children lack basic literacy.
The program also has its critics, especially in education circles. Some agree that teachers should be accountable, but argue that the teachers should answer to their own principals or school boards, not to the Ministry of Education.
Liberal education critic Gerald Kennedy says Queen’s Park cannot wave away schools’ problems with the “magic wand” of centralized tests.
Teachers’ unions across the province are united in opposing the program. They have told their members to take as many courses they want, but to avoid tests or any other form of assessment.
Then there are those who say professional development and teacher evaluation is already happening—that this is nothing new.
Louise Crossan, elementary affiliate president for the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association, said at a Nov. 14 meeting at Algonquin College, “Teachers work for professional development already. Teachers care about kids in the classrooms so its very hard to see why [teacher testing] takes this form.”