Appeal for claims of religious dicrimination

An Ottawa-area reporter is doing a story on separate (publicly-funded Catholic) schools and would like to talk to some Ottawa-area non-Catholic parents who, like me, had their children turned away when they tried to enroll them in their local separate school.

In my case, I attempted to enroll my children in our local separate school to escape an extreme overcrowding situation at my local public school that saw JK-aged children bussed well out of town to an under-utilized public school (90 minutes a day on the bus for a two and a half hour school day). I ended up paying over $1700 per month for two years to escape that situation by enrolling my two children in a private school. My Catholic neighbors, of course, had to do no such thing. By virtue of their faith alone, a faith they often have no demonstrable commitment to apart from enrolling their children in the separate school system, they always have a publicly-funded alternative that teaches the provincial curriculum. Adding irony to the story is the fact that I am a Church-going Christian and, to my knowledge, none of my neighbors are. Ontario Catholics bear no greater tax burden than anyone else and, as a group, have no disadvantage that might warrant their preferential treatment. If the discrimination had been based on race or ethnicity, it would have been no more reprehensible and would have stung no less.

I know that several years ago, when the Ottawa public board was not offering JK and the separate board was, many parents applied to enroll their children in the separate board JK program, but were turned away because they were not Catholic. I suspect that during that time, hundreds if not thousands of children were turned away. My suspicion is that for most parents in public schools, Catholic schools only become an option where they clearly offer better service in a given area, or any service at all.

If you or any parents you know have experienced such rejection and are willing to talk about it, please email me at leonard@OneSchoolSystem.org with your contact information (phone number and area of the city you are from).

Thank you,
Leonard Baak
leonard@OneSchoolSystem.org

Harper playing with science

Harper is playing a dangerous game with the future of our most promising medical technologies by appointing a board of religious people who think that life begins at conception to come up with regulations governing fertility treatments and other stuff related to embryos. It's fine to believe what you want but the government cannot afford more importance to to theoretical lives of embryos than to suffering humans! If it is against your beliefs don't use it, I'd even help you fight the government for your right to not get treatment! But don't condemn other to suffer because of your beliefs!

This board is a recipe for disaster since government regulation is all that is needed to derail the research. What is more, it isn't like these regulations are going to matter since if they push research to another country they will eventually come here but we will have to wait longer for the stupid regulations to change, not to mention the economic loss of having the research done in Canada. I get shudders when I think that the government may decide who is allowed to get fertility treatments in the future!

I'm still thinking of ways to fight this so if you have any ideas let me know.