Stop demonizing Alberta’s independent schools

Let’s have a factual, solution-oriented discussion about how to make education better for everyone, writes Catharine Kavanagh. Photo by GlobalStock/Getty Images/Postmedia files

As if there weren’t enough drama in Alberta’s education sphere right now, the latest development is demonizing independent schools . Against the backdrop of a teachers’ strike that has cancelled classes for nearly 740,000 kids in the province’s public, Catholic and francophone schools, a citizen’s initiative petition has been launched that seeks a referendum on whether Alberta should eliminate provincial funding for independent schools. Yanking funding from others would do nothing to improve the lot of overcrowded neighbourhood schools but it would certainly hurt Alberta kids.

The vast majority of Alb