Official Languages Committee on April 25th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the 77^th meeting of the Standing Committee on Official Languages on this Thursday, April 25, 2013.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108, we will proceed with the study on second-language official language immersion programs in Canada.

Representatives of two groups will appear before us today.

We have Mr. Thompson and Mr. Shea from the Quebec Community Groups Network.

We also have Ms. Bourbonnais and Mr. Le Dorze from the Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers.

Welcome, everyone.

First we will hear evidence for an hour and a half until 5:00 p.m. Then we will take 15 minutes to discuss committee business, that is to say the witness list for our study and its calendar. There will be votes in the House at 5:15 p.m. That will give you enough time to get to the Centre Block.

As there were no witnesses able to come next Tuesday, there will be no meeting next Tuesday. We'll continue the study on Thursday next week. So your chair has given you two hours of your life back.

Without further ado, we'll begin with an opening statement from the Quebec Community Groups Network.

[James Shea, Member, Board of Directors, Quebec Community Groups Network]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon Mr. Chong, Mr. Godin, Mr. Dion, and members of the committee.

I would like to say hello to my former colleagues, Mr. Le Dorze and Ms. Bourbonnais, from the CAIT.

The QCGN, the Quebec Community Groups Network, is represented today by Stephen Thompson, our director of policy, research and public affairs, and me. My name is Jim Shea. I'm a member of the Quebec Community Groups Network board of directors. I am a proud resident of Aylmer in the City of Gatineau.

I also served as the executive director of Canadian Parents for French from 2002 to 2011. I served as a teacher and principal in the provinces of Quebec and Ontario. I was one of the pioneer educators—I didn't label myself that, but other people did—of Ottawa's bilingual programs and retired as a superintendent of education in Ottawa to pursue my passion for linguistic duality in Canada with Canadian Parents for French. I'm pleased to continue my advocacy as a member of the board of directors of the Quebec Community Groups Network.

We understand that the committee will be hearing from the Quebec English School Boards Association and other experts within our community's education sector who will be able to answer specific questions on access, capacity, waiting lists, best practices, and efficiencies. The QCGN is here today to explain the importance of second official language programs to Canada's English linguistic minority communities, that is, the English-speaking community of Quebec.

The Standing Senate Committee on Official Languages noted the popularity of immersion programs among English-speaking families and the years of efforts that our parents have put into campaigning for improvements in the teaching of French in English language schools. Our school boards “place considerable weight on ensuring that their students are fluent in French”, and immersion programs are a vital component of these efforts.

English-speaking Quebec is rightfully proud of French immersion, a product—a genesis, if you want—of parents in Saint-Lambert, Quebec finding a better way to provide their children with the language skills they would need to live and succeed in Quebec and, of course, in Canada. We quote the Lester B. Pearson School Board in the Senate committee's report:

Quebec English schools have always been at the forefront of second language teaching and learning, and were responsible for the development of internationally recognized French language immersion programs. We have perfected the teaching of French through immersion to the extent that people come from the world over to learn our methods for acquiring a second language.

We want this committee to understand that becoming bilingual is not an altruistic pursuit for English-speaking youth in Quebec. Bilingualism is not a matter of simply expanding opportunities or acquiring a desirable asset for potential employers. For that story, we urge the committee to hear from French-speaking parents in Quebec about their efforts to ensure that their children learn both official languages.

Bilingualism for English-speaking Quebec is a matter of getting a job. It is an economic necessity.

For example, data contained in a research report recently published by Canadian Heritage and the Canadian Institute for Research on Linguistic Minorities demonstrated that the baseline salaries of unilingual English speakers are 18% less than those of unilingual French-speaking Quebeckers. The salaries of bilingual English speakers and unilingual French speakers are at par, with bilingual French speakers earning 12.6% more than both of these cohorts.

Bilingualism is not a silver bullet for finding a job. Despite overall higher levels of education and high rates of bilingualism within our population, the 2006 census data shows an overall unemployment rate within the English-speaking community of Quebec that is 2.2% higher than that of the French-speaking majority.

Speaking, reading, and writing French are clearly critical skills in finding a job in Quebec. For example, in the lower north shore, where learning French is difficult, the bilingualism rate among the English-speaking population is 22%, compared with 65% across the entire community. When the fishery collapsed, residents were forced to leave not only their home villages but their home provinces to find seasonal work because of a lack of French language skills.

Along la Côte-Nord, English-speaking unemployment was 28.7%, as compared with 10.9% for the majority. The promise of good jobs in the future mining industry of northeastern Quebec is not accessible for members of this isolated English-speaking community, in large measure because the population does not have the French skills to acquire the required technical and trades training and provincial certification.

You as a committee will learn from the experts who appear before you during this study that French immersion is not a matter of simply teaching subjects in French. Immersion teaching is a specialized skill that requires long-term investments on the part of schools, school boards, and teachers. Intensive French instruction for our community is a tangible necessity, because being fluent in the language of the majority is absolutely necessary for an individual's economic future in Quebec.

Economic prosperity is one of six strategic priorities identified in our community's “2012-2017 Community Priorities and Enabling Strategies” document. To us English-speaking Quebeckers, economic prosperity means greater access to employment and educational opportunities and higher levels of bilingualism.

Bilingualism is the key to the economic prosperity of English-speaking Quebeckers and the resilience of our communities. For our children and grandchildren, French immersion is how we get there.

Thank you very much. Merci.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you, Mr. Shea.

Now we will hear from the representatives of the Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers.

[Philippe Le Dorze, President, Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers]

Good afternoon. My name is Philippe Le Dorze and I am President of the Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers.

Can you hear me?

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Yes, that is fine. We will—

[Joyce Bateman, Conservative, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

It is usually possible for us to hear you without microphones.

But that is not possible today, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

The technicians are going to straighten it out. Meanwhile, just use your earpiece to turn up the volume.

Go ahead, Monsieur Le Dorze. You have the floor. We can hear you through our earpieces.

[Philippe Le Dorze]

As I was saying, I am President of the Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers and I am employed by the Pembina Trails School Division in Winnipeg.

I in turn would like to say hello to Mr. Shea, my former colleague and neighbour of the CAIT in Ottawa.

You didn't lose a beat, Jim. It's good to see you in such fine form.

As the authority on French immersion in Canada, the Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers is a professional organization that brings together immersion educators from all parts of the country.

The Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers supports and enriches immersion pedagogy by offering educators professional development, research, and networking opportunities.

The CAIT stimulates research and innovation, and is set apart by its many accomplishments and its willingness to push the envelope to help grow French immersion.

I would like to start by mentioning some facts about French immersion.

We have come a long way in 40 years. In the area of second-language learning, about 350,000 English-speaking Canadian youth are registered in French immersion. Never before have so many Canadians been able to speak both English and French. Today, 5.4 million Canadians can speak both official languages, compared with 2.8 million in 1971. That is virtually twice as many.

Learning a second language is even good for your health. Recent studies have shown that bilingual people are better protected from cognitive diseases such as Alzheimer's.

French as a second language programs in Canada are growing: immersion registration has increased by 10% in recent years. In fact, immersion programs are on the rise nearly everywhere across the country despite the often negative demographics of school populations.

Immersion is and will remain the best program to learn French as a second language. Students achieve a high level of competency in French and do so without affecting their mother tongue or their knowledge of other subjects. It is therefore essential to maintain and expand access to immersion programs because demand is increasing in many areas of the country.

Despite immersion's popularity, much remains to be done to ensure that everyone has equal access. Immersion has proven its worth, and Canada is renowned worldwide for its immersion programs.

However, each province and territory delivers its immersion programs differently. Some institutions limit the number of enrolments, while others charge extra fees to cover transportation costs. Accessibility is not guaranteed for all Canadians.

The CAIT firmly believes that all students should have access to a French immersion program, regardless of where they live.

In some provinces such as British Columbia, for example, immersion is like a lottery: only the lucky ones get in. We object to this state of affairs. Every parent who chooses immersion for their children should have access to it, and they should not be charged additional fees.

Immersion should be accessible to students in both urban and rural areas. Generally speaking, immersion programs are fairly accessible in urban areas. However, many rural areas are underserved. For example, in a school board in Ontario, the immersion program offers 100% of classes in French in an urban area and only 50% of classes in French in a rural area.

We need a common vision for all the provinces and territories. It would be advisable to support adding more immersion classes in rural areas and in places with high demand.

Many school boards do not provide transportation for students enrolled in the immersion program. Transportation should be provided at no cost for both urban and rural students.

In the next Roadmap for Linguistic Duality, targets should be set to increase accessibility to immersion programs for all Canadians. The provinces and territories should set rules governing the creation of new immersion classes offered by school boards, according to the principles of equal access. For example, Manitoba has established policies governing immersion programs and access to them. It is a good example in that regard.

Immersion should also be accessible to newcomers. Immigrants are often excluded from immersion programs. They are not encouraged to enrol, and in some cases they are even discouraged, despite the impressive results allophone students obtain when they are admitted. Currently, there are no federal, provincial or territorial policies in place to ensure that allophone students and their parents are aware of immersion programs so they can apply.

Allophones have a strong interest in learning both official languages since they see it as a valuable asset in the labour market. Many studies have shown that the children of immigrants do very well in immersion programs, and often achieve better results than anglophones born and raised in Canada.

According to a study by Canadian Parents for French, 80% of allophone parents did not receive any information about French immersion programs in the education system. Despite the efforts of various educators to discourage them from applying for immersion programs, support for linguistic duality and French as a second language remains high among allophones. In fact, 60% said they believed that learning both of Canada's official languages would be an asset for their children, and 40% enrolled their children in French immersion programs.

In the next road map for linguistic duality we should be thinking of establishing goals and strategies to boost learning of French as a second or third language for allophones or newcomer Canadians.

Immersion should also be accessible for students with learning disabilities. Our first instinct is often to keep students with learning disabilities out of immersion programs. Many people think that immersion is for gifted students. However, research has shown that anglophone students with learning difficulties are no more at risk in a French immersion classroom than they are in an English classroom. These students achieve even better results in French than students enrolled in a regular French program.

In many institutions, there is a lack of specialized immersion services for students with learning difficulties. It is important to provide support for children, parents and immersion teachers by giving them the tools they need to help children with learning disabilities succeed and benefit from all the advantages of bilingualism.

The points of entry into immersion programs vary from one institution to another. There are essentially three entry points: early immersion, which is for students in kindergarten and grade 1; middle immersion, in grades 4 and 5; and late immersion, usually in grades 7 or 8.

The type of immersion program and the level of intensity of the program help determine the level of language proficiency. Early immersion programs generally produce better results than the other programs. However, in Canada, there are no standard entry points. In New Brunswick, for example, early immersion is no longer offered despite the number of studies showing that French immersion programs have no negative effect on English-language skills and that, on the contrary, they improve students' skills in French. All researchers have reported that learning a second language improves students' first-language skills.

In my opinion, the entry point that should be favoured in giving Canadians the broadest choice is kindergarten or grade 1. Having students start immersion in kindergarten and providing students who have difficulty with support measures ensure the greatest diversity within the immersion program.

However, this does not mean that access should be limited to early immersion. We also need to encourage jurisdictions to offer a variety of entry points so that everyone has access to French immersion and so that we have sufficient numbers to offer the full range of courses at the secondary level.

Each parent should be informed about immersion programs and entry points, as well as the level of language proficiency associated with each option.

Secondary and postsecondary programs are also a concern. In some cases, students leave immersion programs in high school to prepare themselves for postsecondary studies in their first language, which is often English, citing the lack of courses in certain subjects, timetable conflicts or simply a generally weariness.

Continuation of French-as-a-second-language studies at university is therefore important to the success of immersion at the high school level.

In 2009, the Commissioner of Official Languages published a study titled Two Languages, a World of Opportunities on second-language learning at Canadian universities. The study found that few institutions offer immersion programs or related support services that allow students to take courses in their discipline taught in their second language. Mr. Fraser also noted the limited cooperation and low number of partnerships between French- and English-language universities in Canada. Moreover, second-language policies and language-proficiency requirements are lacking. The study identified several ways forward, including promoting content-based learning, providing opportunities to use the language in social settings and maximizing the use of resources, such as professors, small classes, learning assistance, tutors and new technologies, to name only a few.

The Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers firmly believes that universities have an important role to play in the training of young bilinguals to help the public service recruit some 5,000 bilingual employees per year that will be needed over the next few years.

Immersion teachers are proud to contribute to Canada's linguistic duality. Always looking to improve the quality of education, they are concerned about the shortage of bilingual teachers. Schools sometimes hire teachers who do not have adequate language skills or do not know the methods for teaching living languages.

Educational resources have improved in the last few years, but they are still rarely adapted to immersion and are often simply translations. There is a need for immersion-specific resources.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Pardon me, Mr. Le Dorze.

You've gone for 12 minutes now.

I'm going to seek the consent of the committee to allow the witness to continue his opening statement. I think it would take another three minutes. Do I have the consent of the committee to give him the three minutes to finish his opening statement?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you.

Mr. Le Dorze, you have the floor. You may finish your presentation.

[Philippe Le Dorze]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Given that immersion teachers work for anglophone school boards, professional development in French for immersion teachers is rarely available. There is a need for professional development opportunities tailored to the needs of immersion teachers so that they can keep abreast of new educational practices.

Here are a few possible courses of action: improve language and cultural skills during studies by offering intensive language courses, exchanges and extended stays in a second-language environment; encourage education faculties to enhance their basic training programs for second-language teachers; provide teachers and other teaching staff with varied professional development and ongoing training opportunities; provide support and mentoring services to new teachers; provide a professional development program on managing second-language programs for school administrators; encourage the production of educational resources specific to immersion and that are not translations.

I will briefly talk about the fact that there are no common tools in Canada to assess bilingualism levels, whether in the education system or by employers in both the public sector and the private sector. This means there is no common language to describe the various levels of bilingualism.

What does it mean to be bilingual? Without common tools to define bilingualism, students can, and often do, underestimate their linguistic abilities and believe that they are not qualified for a bilingual position. The reverse is also true. Adopting a common framework for second languages for Canada would help establish a common system for assessing the language skills of students in second-language programs.

Young people would have the benefit of knowing how bilingual they are on an internationally recognized scale. They could then gauge their learning in a real-world context, take a greater interest in learning their second language, increase their confidence in their abilities, and better promote themselves to potential employers in Canada and around the world.

There is an assessment tool that is very well made and increasingly popular among parents, students and teachers in Canada. It is the DELF, a diploma consistent with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, the CEFR. It is used to assess language skills in four areas. Recognized internationally, the DELF is valid for life. Nearly 300,000 people earn it every year, including more than 5,000 from Canada, and that number is rising fast.

Moreover, the DELF for schools is completely consistent with the language skills targeted by the various FSL programs across Canada. Some jurisdictions have even based their curriculum on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. However, the provinces and territories do not have a common approach that would allow them to exchange expertise on language skills assessments and use the CEFR to that end.

The Canadian Association of Immersion Teachers believes it's time to initiate steps towards the establishment of the national language assessment tool for French as a second language for schools, universities, and professionals. Our association would be more than happy to lead this national project with the participation of ministries of education. No doubt we have the expertise in Canada. We simply need to work together to create this new Canadian tool.

Educating young Canadians through French immersion helps guarantee a bilingual future for our country, a future where recognizing the value of English and French also makes us value the other languages spoken in Canada.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you for your speech, Mr. Le Dorze.

We have an hour and five minutes for questions and comments.

We will begin with Mr. Godin.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to welcome you all to this meeting.

I will begin with you, Mr. Le Dorze. You talked about teachers. One message emerged from testimony that we heard here on Tuesday. It appears that several teachers—not all, of course—do not really have appropriate training for teaching purposes. That is mainly the case in the provinces where there are smaller numbers of bilingual people, which makes it more difficult to find teachers.

Is that correct?

[Philippe Le Dorze]

The number of potential candidates for immersion positions is a problem.

For example, if a position is advertised at an English-language school in my school board in Winnipeg, management can receive 50 to 70 applications. For a French teaching position at an immersion school, management will receive six applications, three of them from candidates who do not speak French.

Consequently, it is very difficult to find teachers who are capable of taking on the responsibilities of a French immersion teacher in regions in western Canada.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Shea, there is the same problem if you look at Quebec. I don't know what it would be in Montreal, but in Rivière-au-Renard, there’s not a big majority of anglophones, and I think they have difficulties. As a matter of fact, when I was going around, even in Sherbrooke they had difficulties because of the population that they have.

At the same time, when it comes to the teachers, do they have adequate, and I wouldn't say training, but competence to do it?

[James Shea]

I will speak as an educator, because that's my background. In order to teach French immersion, knowledge of the language is critical, but so is training.

You can't just take a francophone from a francophone environment and say, “You are going to teach French immersion”. There are specific training skills that are required to understand the dynamics within the context of learning the language from another perspective.

There is an element of attracting teachers and keeping them, but there is also the element of training so that the teaching-learning experience is successful. It's a specific métier, if you will, to be—and I'm not speaking for the teachers here but as someone who has worked as one.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Do you believe that in the federal government...because education is the responsibility of the province, right?

[James Shea]

Yes.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

There's no question about it. It's in the Constitution, and we're not going to open the Constitution today. It's in the Constitution.

[James Shea]

Absolutely.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

What can the federal government do? You have the road map. You have all kinds of money. It would be the same thing with Winnipeg or anywhere across the country. What can the government do with their road map and the money? If you look at part VII of the Official Languages Act, the government has the responsibility to promote the language and maybe it could help. Maybe it could play a role in bringing all the ministers of education together across the country to try to find solutions. It wouldn't be to get into the program and what they do, but money is always welcome, right? It helps.

What recommendations would you like to make to the government?

[James Shea]

From my perspective, one of the challenges is a function of numbers. If you were to hire a science teacher, for example, it would be no different whether it was a science teacher or a math teacher: the money is the same to hire a teacher.

Sometimes with learning French as a second language, when you have small school communities, for example in la Côte-Nord where you have a small student population, there is an element of sometimes having to teach two things at the same time. If you're trying to teach two options at the same time, you reduce the groups and, therefore, you need additional dollars to support the teachers, because you're teaching two subjects at the same time.

One of the factors is to recognize within a minority language situation in Quebec—and I realize that's like walking on eggs from a language and education perspective—that supports are going to have to be put in place so that the English-speaking community will be able to master French, because they need it to graduate high school, quite frankly.

If you have a higher dropout rate because English-speaking students are not learning French, obviously there's a crisis there, and we have to find ways of addressing that.

I'm not here to speak from a school board perspective, but the Quebec Community Groups Network wants to be able to participate in the community with the learning of two languages, as opposed to just the learning of English. Sometimes additional dollars to provide the additional resources are critical, particularly where you have small student numbers.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Besides for providing money, is there another role that the federal government could play?

[Stephen Thompson, Director, Policy, Research and Public Affairs, Quebec Community Groups Network]

We can take the Canada-Quebec agreement on health as an example. Part of the money that's provided is for a project that's run out of McGill University, which provides English language training to francophone health professionals.

You may know that Quebec recently abandoned the idea of having intensive English in French schools. It was largely an HR issue. They didn't have the English teachers to do it.

If federal money were provided to help train English teachers for the French system, that might be something the federal government could do, but that's not the English-speaking community talking there.