Escape from mediocrity: French Immersion growth causing pain for Ontario boards

A scholastic refugee?

Too many students. Not enough teachers.

Struggling to keep up with demand for French Immersion, and how to ensure equal opportunity to its benefits, some Ontario school boards are considering caps on enrolment for the popular program or delaying its start. Others, such as the Peel District School Board, have taken a hard stand and put a 25 per cent cap in place.

In Halton, explosive growth in French Immersion — which now serves 21,000, or almost half of all elementary students — is threatening both the French and English programs.

“We have about 13 of our schools with less than 15 students choosing to remain in the English program,” said newly appointed director of education Stuart Miller, who has been part of an ongoing program viability committee looking at the issues. “We have some really small cohorts in those 13 schools — in some schools there are three or four kids.”  (more...)

French Immersion growth causing pain for Ontario boards

"...the unspoken issue is that French Immersion is considered something like a private system within the public system, allowing parents to enroll their children in classes with few, if any, at-risk or special-needs students."

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French Immersion For the Right Reasons?