Saturday, May 31, 2008

Letters to the editor | Real education crime is lack of resources

Telegraph-Journal, Published Saturday May 31st, 2008

Minister Lamrock and his handful of political hawks are leading his Liberal government on a war path. He thinks he's found the weapon of mass destruction in the education system and it's called EFI.

He struck quickly and with stealth. He received a biased report and then dropped the bomb two weeks later. He's been spinning political propaganda ever since, convincing the public and his own caucus that the EFI program is guilty of crimes in the education system. He demonizes his opponents, draws upon misleading and inaccurate statistics, and blacks out parts of reports that don't support his position. He does this all very eloquently. He still comes across as the smartest guy in the room, sincere, concerned and genuine.

But shrewd is not the same as smart. A smart politician would have looked a little deeper, would have actually consulted with the experts, teachers, and parents. He would have been flexible in his policy decisions, not single minded. He would have been truthful in his approach.

Instead, he has his own agenda, claiming that EFI is the smoking gun. The real crime against New Brunswick children is the lack of resources in the education system, as all past reports have stated. Lamrock could have done the right thing and lobbied his government to address inclusion, enhance Core French, infuse EFI with real resources and still fully implement his Intensive French program.

This would have produced a true increase in learning outcomes, as opposed to smoke screened test results.

MIKE WOLFE, Fredericton

1 comment:

Harold Jarche said...

The Minister is a master of rhetoric but a rank amateur with the scientific method. This works for the short term but I am hopeful that in the long term the mountains of data will overwhelm his attempts to game the educational system.