Updates from November, 2024 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 21:34 on 2024-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

    The metro’s green line is down between Angrignon and Berri‑UQAM since 10:30 on Friday morning because of water infiltration near Lionel‑Groulx. Buses are replacing the metro for the moment. It’s expected to be up again Saturday.

    That part of the metro system had also been down earlier on Friday.

    The REM was also down on Friday between Panama and Central Station because of high winds.

    La Presse’s article on neglect of transit maintenance by the CAQ, posted at 5 on Friday morning, seems prescient now.

     

    • Kate 09:41 on 2024-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

      CTV did an interview with Mayor Plante this week. Watch her wiggle out of the question of the image of the woman in hijab at city hall.

       

      • Kate 08:36 on 2024-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

        Weekend notes from CityCrunch, La Presse, CultMTL.

        Also, the road closures.

         

        • Kate 08:11 on 2024-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

          Some parents, which La Presse describes as d’origine maghrébine, are described as blocking the standard sex ed program in three schools in Côte‑des‑Neiges. The governing boards of these schools are not supposed to control the curriculum – but, in this case, they do.

          Also investigated by Le Devoir.

          The question here is how much of a kid’s education should be determined by the parents, how much by the state. I’m not a parent so I’m not sure what determination I would make in this situation. If I were religious and feared that the school would make my kid into a sinner – ?

           

          • Chris 09:21 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            That’s not what they fear. They fear their kids being made into non-believers. And so they must be kept in ignorance.

            (With sex ed, they’d learn Quran 86:7 is wrong for example. But how can that be, the book is god’s direct word!)

          • SMD 09:22 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            … you could enrol your kid in a private religious school, and the state would still fund 60% of their education.

          • jeather 09:57 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            This happens in public schools with traditional Catholics — I know kids at some — I’m sure we’ll see similar articles about those, right?

            You can look up the sex ed in elementary school; it’s pretty basic stuff.

          • Kate 10:18 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            Chris, I’m thrilled you understand the attitudes of Muslim parents so well.

            jeather, you’re right. If these reporters want to be even-handed, they need to look into the Catholic thing too.

          • jeather 10:27 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            I will note, re your question: these parents are not simply deciding what their children are learning, they are deciding what all children at the school are learning.

            And we, as a province, have decided that parents get very little input into what their children learn; or at least, there is a standard base they must all learn, and parents get no input into that (though as the articles note, this is not really true in practice). I would have assumed that this level of control was mostly elementary school — after all, parents have no voice into their child’s medical care at 14 — but the article shows it’s high school too.

          • Kate 12:02 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            It would be odd in a class of, say, 25 kids, if most of them had to go sit in the library while a half dozen kids got the sex ed lesson.

          • Meezly 12:16 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            Haven’t read the article, but I always thought that parents usually had the option to have their kids opt out of sex ed due to whatever religious/cultural reason?

            I also thought that sex ed was provided in public schools by the state (hopefully with health experts having input into the curriculum and not school admin) because parents are generally terrible about this subject, not just reproduction, but the whole spectrum of sexuality in the 21st c.

          • bob 12:17 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            @Kate – That happens in a Simpson’s episode from 1992, when Ezekiel and Ishmael, in accordance with their parents’ wishes, are allowed to pray for their souls in the hall during a screening of “Fuzzy Bunny’s Guide to You Know What (c)1971”. Still happens today in some jurisdictions.

          • dhomas 13:47 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            As mentioned in the aritcle, sex ed is, as of this year, mostly part of the Culture et Citoyenneté Québécoise (CCQ) program, which replaced the Éthique et Culture Religieuse (ECR). This program is mandatory, again as of this year. Students and parents are no longer allowed to be exempt from any part of this program. Why is this even being discussed? I don’t get to decide what the curriculum is at my kids’ school; neither should they. Imagine if everyone wanted to dictate what “should” be taught? What a mess that would be. If these folks are not happy with what is being taught, they can homeschool or go private.

          • Joey 14:29 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            Interesting article. Sounds like some conservative religious parents tried to take over the school’s governance structure so they could impose their beliefs on the curriculum – the school refused (quite rightly; this is a school where some students infamously used a chat program to threaten their gay teacher with violence and false claims of abuse) and shut them down.

          • steph 11:26 on 2024-11-02 Permalink

            Homeschool and private shouldn’t be able to flout certain minimums in education. Children that are homeschooled are still tied to school boards, and those school boards are still responsible for testing that the children are learning the right things. Are they only testing English, French & Math? Clearly other basic subjects need to be covered (like sex ed), and children failing while being homeschooled shouldn’t be allowed to be home schooled.

          • Kate 13:22 on 2024-11-02 Permalink

            I’m puzzled by homeschooling. Most parents are not trained teachers. Most parents are bound to have weak spots in their own understanding of certain subjects. And I get the impression most parents homeschool from religious or similar impulses to protect their kids from the modern world.

            Who would want their parents exercising the same kind of discipline that a classroom teacher has to do? It’s lunacy.

          • Chris 15:02 on 2024-11-02 Permalink

            >This happens in public schools with traditional Catholics — I know kids at some — I’m sure we’ll see similar articles about those, right?

            We’ve indeed seen lots of articles over the years about fundamentalist Christians opposed to teaching sex ed and evolution in school. We’ve seen articles about Hasidic schools teaching almost nothing but Torah. These Muslims aren’t getting picked on here, they’re getting equal treatment to other flavours of religious fundamentalists.

            >Chris, I’m thrilled you understand the attitudes of Muslim parents so well.

            That’s probably sarcasm, but yes, I do know the topic pretty well. You certainly can’t generalize to “Muslim parents”, there’s an infinite variety, from ISIS types to those that eat pork and drink booze, and everything in between. But these articles are talking about a particular type, and, as a group, their worldview is generally well understood. We can generalize to a certain extent, as we likewise might generalize about the types of Christians that don’t want evolution taught.

            >If these reporters want to be even-handed, they need to look into the Catholic thing too.

            Send them your scoop, I’m sure they would. But if such things happen 10x more frequently in an Islamic context vs a Christian context, would you expect 50/50 reporting? It’s like giving 50/50 airtime to pro and anti climate scientists, when in fact 90% of scientists are on the same side.

          • walkerp 17:20 on 2024-11-02 Permalink

            I’m generally against home schooling but as a counterpoint I have a neighbour who is homeschooling their son. No religious affiliation or anything, he just couldn’t deal in school for various reasons.

          • Kate 18:44 on 2024-11-02 Permalink

            That’s sad. School can be harsh, but so can work and other aspects of adult life.

        • Kate 07:40 on 2024-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

          In the spirit of All Saints Day, the Journal remembers the 50,000 people buried under Dorchester Square, which was St‑Antoine cemetery in the first half of the 19th century.

          A writer for Habs Eyes on the Prize visited some of the graves of members of the Canadiens and people closely connected with the team, and posted these articles a year ago and just now.

           

          • Orr 16:49 on 2024-11-01 Permalink

            It is good to keep the memories of these hockey greats alive.
            Victoriaville has a lovely downtown park/monument/shrine to hockey great and all-round tremendously good-person Jean Béliveau. Victoriaville was where he started to play competitive hockey at school & professionally, and at age 15 he was already a star. The monument has markers around it with inscriptions identifying the traits that Béliveau had, like integrity, sense of honour, respect, and determination.

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