00:00:00.000Alberta has introduced a law to remove ideology from classrooms.
00:00:09.620It would ban teachers and school boards from pushing their politics or other social statements
00:00:15.300or views onto their students. Education and Child Care Minister Dimitrios Nikolaitis says
00:00:21.640the bill is also designed to give parents for say over their children's education.
00:00:26.240Our guest today is Minister Demetrius Nicolaitis. Welcome to the show, sir.
00:00:31.120My pleasure. Thanks so much for having me.
00:00:33.340Talk about this bill, because it is an interesting one. It has made national news.
00:00:38.340Exactly what kind of ideology do you want to remove from classrooms?
00:00:43.400What we really want to do with this bill is make sure that school divisions,
00:00:48.640principals, or teachers, or other leaders are not imposing their personal views onto students.
00:00:56.240Of course, everybody has their own personal views, and that's fine.
00:00:59.520However, we firmly believe that within our education system, students should be taught how to think, not what to think.
00:01:07.520And in addition to some of those provisions, we're also adding more protection to student voices.
00:01:14.740And we've made explicit changes to ensure that, again, teachers, principals, or others are allowing and facilitating diverse viewpoints of students to come to the forefront.
00:01:26.080we want students to be able to engage in important conversations and have important topics but we
00:01:31.920want them to be able to formulate their own views independently our education system should provide
00:01:36.400them with the facts and the information so that they can formulate their own opinions
00:01:41.760yeah i mean there's nothing new about teachers giving their views in a classroom i certainly
00:01:47.520remember teachers doing that back when i was a kid in grade school i mean it was only later on
00:01:53.120you realize that it was just their opinion that they were expressing. It sounds to me
00:01:58.480that you suspect that there are a lot of radical teachers out there who are in school specifically
00:02:04.880to push a particular political view, probably hard left, onto their students. Is this what
00:02:11.120you're trying to prevent? Well, unfortunately, some concerning
00:02:15.600situations have come to light over the past few months and years. I'll provide you a couple of
00:02:20.560of examples. As recently as January of this year, a recording was leaked about a teacher in Fort
00:02:26.000Saskatchewan who was speaking very negatively about people from Fort McMurray and people who
00:02:32.900support the oil and gas sector in the province. Another example back, this is a little bit further
00:02:38.900back, but in June of 2023, a Muslim girl who decided not to attend school one day because
00:02:46.780the school is organizing some pride activities that day, was berated by her teacher and told
00:02:51.900that she should not be in Canada and should not be there if she didn't support those types of
00:02:59.200activities. This is very concerning. Our schools must be places of learning, must be areas where
00:03:05.780we teach kids the foundations, reading, writing, math, critical thinking, how to excel, and not be
00:03:13.260places where we villainize students or, um, or push a certain narrative onto their opinions.
00:03:22.220Yeah. I mean, the problem happens when you have teachers pushing that narrative
00:03:26.140and students thinking that it's fact, you know, they can't figure out that what the teacher is
00:03:32.460saying, because this is an authoritative, this is an authority figure, right? Standing at the front
00:03:37.740of the class, telling you things. And you listen to this person, you think in a child's mind that
00:03:42.780this person is telling me the truth, that this is the way things are. And they get a hold of your
00:03:47.100kids, you know, like the Jesuits say, you know, give us your kid up until age five and we own
00:03:52.700them for life. You know, these teachers have access to students and they think that they can
00:03:58.620impart onto them their views. And the children are not equipped intellectually to determine
00:04:06.140the difference between this person's opinion and fact if you know what i'm saying yeah absolutely
00:04:15.020i mean the the example that i just provided a moment ago about the muslim girl this was in a
00:04:18.860junior high school so i i can only imagine you know if i was a 13 year old 14 year old and being
00:04:25.340told that i don't belong in canada um i i mean i i would imagine that i would have some serious
00:04:31.020reflection at that age. So that can be incredibly damaging. That kind of commentary has no place
00:04:36.720in our classrooms. Moreover, we, in Alberta, of course, we require mandatory literacy and
00:04:43.120numeracy screening for every child in K-3. And our results show that one in four, 25% of kids
00:04:50.500lack basic reading, writing, and math skills. So we have to ensure that we're focused on building
00:04:56.280those foundations. We're focused on giving kids the education that they need to succeed.
00:05:00.320and not dipping our toe into social issues, political issues.
00:05:19.020We want students to be able to express their diverse views.
00:05:22.060But we're also asking our system leaders to recognize that when they're having those conversations,
00:05:26.940try and be objective, try and be impartial.
00:05:30.320and try to encourage both sides of the debate to come forward.
00:05:33.840Right. Present both sides equally and then say, where do you stand on this?
00:05:41.040Which is kind of what the media should be doing.
00:05:44.320Absolutely. Those were some of my best moments and some of the moments that I remember the
00:05:51.440most from my education was when we were actually challenged in our own thinking.
00:05:56.880Say, well, you know, you have this view, but have you considered this alternative view or why don't you consider that?
00:06:02.760And to actually, you know, look a little bit critically at the thoughts that we hold ourselves or for me, some of the most profound moments in my education.
00:06:12.000Are you getting some pushback as expected from teachers, unions, that sort of thing who feel that this is going to stymie teachers?
00:06:19.460Teachers are going to feel uncertain about what they're doing and they're going to be affected somehow negatively.
00:06:26.880by this law where do you position yourself on that no that i i don't believe that that'll be
00:06:32.800the case at all um you know i know the vast majority of teachers are uh incredible professionals
00:06:41.040who who work diligently to to provide a strong education to children and what the bill actually
00:06:46.800does as i mentioned is help create a little bit more of a road map as to how to have these
00:06:52.960conversations so all we're saying is if you want to have some conversations about what's happening
00:06:58.560in you know world affairs today or what's happening in the province or the country politically socially
00:07:04.560make sure that you're presenting the topic impartially objectively and again make sure
00:07:10.000that you are encouraging students to bring diverse views forward again i know that there
00:07:16.160there have been situations where a student has an alternative perspective and it's it's not
00:07:22.000supported because maybe it's not the mainstream view and we have to ensure debate not just for
00:07:28.240the development of those individual children but for the health and well-being of our entire society
00:07:33.680if we lose the ability to have honest and open debate about sensitive subjects the entire health
00:07:42.160of our democracy and our society is at risk now i take it there will be disciplinary action taken
00:07:48.720against teachers who violate the rules. Are we talking about firing teachers, suspending teachers,
00:07:55.360if it comes out that they are pushing, say, their views about the oil sector or the environment or
00:08:04.960sexuality, for instance, or the trans issue, that kind of thing, if they push these subjects onto
00:08:12.240students so we do have of course a teacher code of conduct in place and the school divisions
00:08:20.720themselves are the ones who have final responsibility when it comes to to hiring
00:08:27.360but one of the things that we we have done recently this uh began back in 2023 is we created
00:08:35.280more independence around the teacher discipline process it used to be the entire process used to
00:08:40.240be housed within the Alberta Teachers Association. But we moved that function out of the union
00:08:47.840and established it through an arm's length agency to provide more independence to teacher
00:08:54.320discipline process. So that process will continue. And if any individual believes that there's been
00:09:01.120any violation of the new rules, should the legislation pass and become law, that mechanism
00:09:06.000will be available to them. Now, this is also a bill that wants to allow parents to play a bigger
00:09:15.520role in their kids' education. Can you talk a little bit about what your expectations are there?
00:09:22.400Yeah, absolutely. My view is that parents are the primary drivers of their child's education
00:09:27.760and have to retain full authority at all times over the delivery of education to their children
00:09:33.840in terms of guidance and direction. So what we're doing is in the Education Act, we're asking school
00:09:42.020boards, so we'll be directing them, to update policies and procedures that they have regarding
00:09:49.800parental involvement so that parents are involved in more of a meaningful way rather than any type
00:09:58.400of a symbolic gesture. We want parents to have, be able to have a greater say. And again, I firmly
00:10:04.800believe that when you have parents and educators working closely together to support the best
00:10:11.640interests of a child, you absolutely create the best possible condition. So we need to make sure
00:10:16.560that parents have a strong seat at the table. I would think that views around the resource sector
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00:10:23.900would be particularly touchy in Alberta, where you have so many people employed in the resource
00:10:28.720sector. And it's a polarizing issue amongst those on the left, which believes that it's going to
00:10:37.340destroy the planet. We see the new leader of the NDP federally saying no more pipelines,
00:10:44.800keep things the way they are, but no growth around the resource sector. And so it's a major economic
00:10:51.160issue. And if you have schools as a hotbed of leftist Marxist ideology, pushing the idea that
00:11:01.120the resource sector is bad, and if your parents work in the oil sector, well, they're bad,
00:11:05.700they're destroying the planet. I can see where this would cause major problems at home.
00:11:10.380Is this, at its core, what this law is designed to stop?
00:11:15.880I think, you know, there have been some concerns in this regard because we did, as I mentioned
00:11:22.660earlier, we did hear some examples of this as recently as January of this year. I think,
00:11:29.000you know, ultimately, our intent with this bill is to ensure that our school divisions
00:11:35.740and our entire education system is laser focused on student success and academic success.
00:11:41.320I mentioned a moment ago about some of the concerning numbers regarding student literacy, numeracy abilities, their abilities to read, write, and in other areas.
00:11:53.240About a quarter of students right now, as I mentioned, are lacking in those basic skill set.
00:11:58.760And so we have to make sure our education system is not concerning itself with the politics of the day, social issues of the day.
00:12:08.180we have to ensure that it is hyper-focused on educating our children, helping them read,
00:12:14.660write, do math, and excel. And so there's a suite of changes being proposed in this bill to the
00:12:22.140Education Act. There's also changes that would give the provincial government a greater say
00:12:26.600over the establishment of school board priorities, in addition to some of these additional rules
00:12:33.120about neutrality and impartiality. And as well, there are other changes in the bill that will
00:12:38.640mandate reading, writing, and math intervention if a student is being flagged as at risk.
00:12:49.360It also prohibits violence. We've heard serious concerns about violence and aggression in the
00:12:58.000classroom so the entirety of the bill and the vision behind the bill is to help ensure we're
00:13:04.720focused on addressing violence supporting kids in their ability to read write and keeping other
00:13:11.520issues out of the classroom i'm wondering if students will be encouraged to i don't want to
00:13:17.280use their words rat out their teachers but that's basically it i mean if they go to school sometimes
00:13:22.800you see videos produced but if the if the cameras are taken away or the phones are taken away when
00:13:27.680they first walk into their classroom and they won't be able to do that. But will students be
00:13:32.400encouraged to raise the issue publicly or through various organizations, perhaps your department or
00:13:39.520some school board, if they feel uncomfortable about views that were expressed in the classroom?
00:13:45.920Because otherwise, how are you going to know that it's going on?
00:13:50.640Yeah. The bill doesn't make any additional provisions in that regard, but I think it
00:13:55.920it goes without saying, at any point in time, even before this bill, if any student, any parent,
00:14:02.240or anyone has any concerns with anything that's happening in our education system, they can raise
00:14:07.980that. They can raise that to the school principal, the school authority, my office. There are a
00:14:12.800number of different vehicles and mechanisms in which they can raise those concerns. So
00:14:17.220I would openly encourage anyone who has any concerns to raise those through the appropriate
00:14:22.700channels. And again, I'm confident that we can keep our education system focused
00:14:29.740on supporting our kids and staying out of unnecessary political conversations.
00:14:35.260I'm wondering too, is there a way to filter out political or environmental radicals before
00:14:39.900they get into the school system through their training? I mean, you go right up the supply
00:14:45.740chain for teachers and find, who's applying to be a teacher here? What do we know about this
00:14:52.220individual or do they have views that are inconsistent with those that of those we want
00:15:00.060people in the classroom teaching you know they have like vehemently strong views that we think
00:15:05.820that they might be a risk once they get into the classroom in front of students
00:15:11.820yeah so of course the school divisions themselves are the ones who are responsible for all the
00:15:18.060the hiring practices. However, the government of Alberta, we set the standards for teacher
00:15:24.420certification. And, you know, I have heard some concerns. I have a colleague who, a friend
00:15:32.980whose daughter is training right now to be a teacher. And she was telling me that one of the
00:15:40.100things that she was learning recently at the university as part of her Bachelor of Education
00:15:44.640program was about the wheel of privilege. Now, I really struggle to understand the relevance
00:15:52.480of that to being able to manage a classroom, help a student read and write. And there have
00:16:00.900been other studies that have occurred in the past, which demonstrated that a significant
00:16:06.200component, a majority of teachers lack basic understanding regarding the science of reading
00:16:14.760and the other elements that are critical to the foundation of literacy and numeracy.
00:16:20.700So I do have some questions and some concerns about teacher preparedness, not just from that
00:16:29.200side, but also from an aggression and violence standpoint. Surveys from the Alberta Teachers
00:16:34.880Association shows that the majority of teachers do not feel well-equipped to be able to handle
00:16:41.280aggression or violence in their classrooms. And so I have questions and I want to
00:16:49.280conduct some more exploration into how we're preparing our teachers to be able to succeed
00:16:53.600in the classroom. Yeah, I would think that would be a big part of it. Prevent the problem from
00:16:59.200starting, go right up the ladder and take a close look at people gravitating towards the teaching
00:17:05.920profession and make sure that those people don't see it as a view to push radical views onto young
00:17:12.000people. That's the way I would see it. I think we need to, similar to the bill,
00:17:18.640make sure that we're focused on giving our teachers the skills and competencies that they need to
00:17:25.600help kids learn how to read, how to write, build the foundations of numeracy,
00:17:32.960how to manage complex classrooms. Our classrooms are more dynamic today than ever before. There's
00:17:37.760way more complexity and cognitive and learning challenges, disabilities that they need to
00:17:44.080address. So I think we have to ensure that we're setting them up for success in that way. And I
00:17:49.600do have some questions and concerns from things that I've been hearing.
00:17:52.080Thank you so much for coming on the show.