After years of controversy, TDSB ends lottery system for specialty schools and programs, drawing praise, criticism

2025/10/22 Leave a comment

Of note. When I attended school in Toronto in the 60s and 70s, the then enriched program switched from English language testing to symbolic graphic testing, with the result that diversity of participants increased:

Toronto’s public school board is scrapping the controversial process that handed out spots in coveted specialty programs through a lottery, returning to one based on merit.

The move — made by the provincial supervisor now in charge of the Toronto District School Board — marks another major shift in how students gain entry to the city’s most sought-after schools and programs focused on the arts, athletics, math and science.

The lottery-based admissions had prioritized bringing under-represented racial groups into the programs, but caused an uproar among some families who said it failed to accomplish that while at the same time weakening program quality. Others, however, had argued the lottery was a fairer system. …

Source: After years of controversy, TDSB ends lottery system for specialty schools and programs, drawing praise, criticism

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Cuts will impact women and racialized public servants disproportionately, new analysis says

2025/10/21 Leave a comment

Likely but excessive growth in public service had to be curbed. Uses a departmental frame rather than an age frame. Annual EE reports will indicate extent of change:

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s coming cuts to the federal public service are expected to disproportionately impact female, Indigenous, racialized and disabled workers, according to a new analysis.

The analysis, published by the left-leaning Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives on Oct. 20, estimated that 59 per cent of the employees whose jobs will be cut will be women, 5.5 per cent will be Indigenous people, 26 per cent will likely be racialized and 8.3 per cent will have a disability.

The analysis found that this outsized impact on these groups would largely be due to the fact that the departments and agencies facing the deepest reductions have some of the most diverse workforces in the federal government. And the organizations expected to see smaller cuts have less diverse employees.

“Depending on how the cuts play out, we can expect wider employment gaps, wider pay gaps and the erosion of access to critical employment benefits,” economists David Macdonald and Katherine Scott wrote in the analysis.

Early in July, Carney’s government announced a spending review asking most departments and agencies to cut 15 per cent of their operational budgets over three years.

The total job losses across the federal government from the spending review could amount to around 57,000 job losses, according to a previous analysis from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

As Carney has promised to boost spending on defence and beefing up with border with the United States, the Department of National Defence (DND), Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) and the RCMP will only see a cut of 2 per cent cut to their operational budgets over those three years. The analysis characterized these organizations as  “equity laggards.”x

Forty-three per cent of the civilian arm of DND are women and CBSA is staffed by around 47 per cent women.

In contrast, the workforce of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) is around 67 per cent women. Macdonald and Scott estimate around 3,915 women could lose their jobs at that department in the coming spending review.

Indigenous Services Canada (ISC), the Department of Justice and Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) are all around 70 per cent women, and could see estimated 918, 604 and 935 women lose their jobs respectively.

In the federal public sector, Scott said women often don’t have to settle for lower paying jobs and are “not questioned if they’re leaving the office at five o’clock to pick up the kids from childcare.”

“You see massive wage gaps in the private sector,” Scott said.

When it comes to Indigenous workers, Scott and Macdonald estimated that around 5.5 per cent of jobs lost will be those of Indigenous workers, outpacing their current share in the public service at 5.3 per cent.

ISC (with a 27 per cent Indigenous workforce), Crown-Indigenous Relations (18 per cent Indigenous) and Correctional Service Canada (11 per cent Indigenous) will lose the most Indigenous jobs, according to Macdonald and Scott. These organizations could see an estimated 359, 84 and 318 Indigenous workers losing their jobs respectively.

Racialized workers make up 31 per cent of ESDC’s workforce and 41 per cent of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, two departments expected to see high job loss as the spending review launches.

Source: Cuts will impact women and racialized public servants disproportionately, new analysis says

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Canada pays highly educated immigrants less money than the U.S., study finds

2025/10/20 Leave a comment

Highlighting retention issues, relative wage gaps between visible minorities and not visible minority remain a concern:

Canada is “relatively successful” at attracting highly educated immigrants, but their counterparts in the United States earn more and have access to better opportunities, a new study says.

The neighbouring countries that have been largely at odds since the Trump administration took over are not only competing when it comes to industries, like the steel and auto sectors. They are also competing for skilled and educated people, especially those in the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.

Researchers noted that now is the time for Canada to push for the “best and the brightest” to come to the country, as the U.S. adopts “a far less welcoming immigration policy.”

The study from the Fraser Institute published on Thursday is shedding light on how certain Canadian immigrants are not reaping as many benefits as their U.S. counterparts who “perform better in terms of both employment status and earnings.” Those two factors are compared to native-born Canadians and Americans, respectively, as benchmarks.

In Canada, highly educated immigrants earned 16 per cent less than native Canadians. In the U.S., immigrants had a higher employment rate (1.2 per cent) and higher compensation (8 per cent) than Americans born in the country.

In 2020, visible minority immigrants in Canada with a bachelor’s degree or higher earned a median of $57,200, whereas native Canadians with a bachelor’s degree earned $68,300 on average.

“The differences were even greater when focusing on cohorts with advanced degrees,” said researchers. “Specifically, the median income of visible minority immigrants with a master’s degree was $65,500. For those with an earned doctorate, it was $84,000.” Canadians born in the country with a master’s earned an average of $84,400, while those with a doctorate earned $100,000.

The wage gap was likely due to “difficulties around the recognition of foreign credentials (and perhaps non-Canadian work experience) for newcomers seeking opportunities in the Canadian labour market,” researchers noted.

In the United States, data from 2022 showed that highly educated American immigrants earned US$122,000, while those born in the U.S. in with the same qualifications earned US$113,000. Researchers said that immigrants out-earning their American counterparts could be due to their “superior performance.”…

Source: Canada pays highly educated immigrants less money than the U.S., study finds

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DEI is ‘illiberal, anti-merit,’ says analyst as Poilievre pushes to end government DEI programs

2025/10/20 2 Comments

The echo chambers reinforce each other. While some measures of merit are objective, character measures are more challenging. And of course the irony given that much of this discourse comes from South of the border, where merit and character are sorely lacking among many politicians and political appointees:

Bringing an end to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives within Canada’s government, as proposed by Pierre Poilievre, would allow people to be chosen for roles based on merit and character, says the founder of a Canadian think tank.

It goes to the basic question of what kind of society you want and what governments should be doing. Governments should not have bureaucracies whose job it is to discriminate based on skin colour, ethnicity, gender,” Mark Milke told National Post.

Milke is the president of Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy, which is dedicated to renewing a common-sense approach to public discourse and policy.

He said diversity, in general, within Canada “adds to the potential for greater understanding, for greater economic growth.” But used within the context of DEI, it can lead to restrictions of Canadian identity based on skin colour.

Milke’s comments come after the Conservative leader urged Canadians to show support in shuttering such programs within the government by signing a petition. Poilievre said he wants to “restore the merit principle” in a post on X….

Source: DEI is ‘illiberal, anti-merit,’ says analyst as Poilievre pushes to end government DEI programs

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Focus Canada: More than half of Canadians think there is too much immigration, poll finds

2025/10/17 Leave a comment

The good news is that for most questions, the decline in support has largely bottomed out. Encouraging that concerns revolve more around immigration program mismanagement and impact on housing, healthcare etc rather than values albeit latter along with refugees and crime remain issues. Partisan differences have increased significantly, likely reflecting Conservative highlighting immigration and citizenship issues and possible influence of USA debates:

A majority of Canadians say there is too much immigration to this country, a new poll suggests, but the percentage of people who believe this has remained stable after a sharp rise over two previous years.

The poll, which was conducted by the Environics Institute for Survey Research in partnership with other groups, also found a widening partisan divide among respondents. Supporters of the federal Conservatives are much more likely to be critical of immigration levels compared with people who support the Liberals or New Democrats.

The survey interviewed 2,004 Canadians via telephone (landline and cellphone) between Sept. 8 and 21. The margin of error for this sample size is plus or minus 2.2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. The survey has been conducted over decades using broad questions to track Canadians’ feelings about immigration.

Fifty-six per cent of respondents said they agreed with the statement, “Overall, there is too much immigration to Canada,” while 38 per cent said they disagreed with it. …

Source: More than half of Canadians think there is too much immigration, poll finds

Survey link: Canadian public opinion about the Immigration & Refugees

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Chris Selley: What Canada can learn from two years of anti-Israel protests

2025/10/17 Leave a comment

Fair points. The citizenship guide does have a reference to imported conflicts: “Some Canadians immigrate from places where they have experienced warfare or conflict. Such experiences do not justify bringing to Canada violent, extreme or hateful prejudices.:

…But we still can lay down some markers about what’s acceptable protest and what isn’t — maybe in the citizenship guide, which is supposed to apply to everyone (not just immigrants). Two principles we could articulate:

Canada is, by design, a land of free expression, including protest, which we treat generously. But at some juncture, having made your point, you have to bugger off from the middle of the road and let people go about their lives. Blocking the road is, after all, illegal. Letting you do it for your cause is a courtesy, not a right. 

If people want to leave homeland conflicts behind, it’s none of your business, even if you share a homeland and think they’re letting the home side down. 

If you target a business for protest because it’s owned by someone who has a different opinion about your homeland, you will be shunned and hooted at unapologetically. 

Meanwhile, Canadian politicians need to take a very long, very hard look at how our police forces conduct their business. Like the Ottawa occupiers before them, the anti-Israel mob has taken outrageous advantage of Canadian police forces’ slavish dedication to de-escalation as the only goal that matters

Source: Chris Selley: What Canada can learn from two years of anti-Israel protests

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Delacourt: Pierre Poilievre says he’d stand up to Donald Trump while taking a page from his playbook

2025/10/17 Leave a comment

Along with the anti-DEI petition:

…On the Friday before the long weekend, Poilievre also endorsed what another Conservative MP, Michelle Rempel Garner, was preaching — an end to birthright citizenship. Or, as Poilievre called it in another post, “birth tourism.”

Again, there’s an echo from one of Trump’s first executive orders on taking office.

“The privilege of United States citizenship is a priceless and profound gift,” the order states, going on to explain that citizenship would not be conferred to any child born in that country to a mother or father not lawfully present in the U.S. or there on a temporary basis.

“Canadian citizenship is a honour and privilege, and it must always be treated as such,” Poilievre said in an Oct. 10 post on X, formerly Twitter.

Neither of these seemingly Trump-inspired initiatives by the Conservatives are scourges in Canada. Fewer than 1,500 of the nearly 400,000 children born in Canada in 2024 were born to mothers whose residence was outside Canada. Railing against diversity, equity and inclusion may get some politicians votes, but it can also play into backlash against immigrants — which the Conservatives always hasten to point out, they’d never do….

Source: Pierre Poilievre says he’d stand up to Donald Trump while taking a page from his playbook

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Trump Considers Overhaul of Refugee System That Would Favor White People

2025/10/16 Leave a comment

“Give me your privileged, your rich, / Your huddled elite yearning to breathe free…”,

The Trump administration is considering a radical overhaul of the U.S. refugee system that would slash the program to its bare bones while giving preference to English speakers, white South Africans and Europeans who oppose migration, according to documents obtained by The New York Times.

The proposals, some of which already have gone into effect, would transform a decades-old program aimed at helping the world’s most desperate people into one that conforms to Mr. Trump’s vision of immigration — which is to help mostly white people who say they are being persecuted while keeping the vast majority of other people out.

The plans were presented to the White House in April and July by officials in the State and Homeland Security Departments after President Trump directed federal agencies to study whether refugee resettlement was in the interest of the United States. Mr. Trump had suspended refugee admissions on his first day in office and solicited the proposals about how and whether the administration should continue the program.

Trump administration officials have not ruled out any of the ideas, according to people familiar with the planning, although there is no set timetable for approving or rejecting the ideas. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the confidential plans….

Source: Trump Considers Overhaul of Refugee System That Would Favor White People

Filed under Multiculturalism, Immigration, Trump administration Tagged with ,

CPC Petition: DEI spending and government waste needs to DIE

2025/10/16 Leave a comment

Virtue signalling for their base and fundraising as a party petition, not one to be tabled in the House of Commons:

Whereas the Liberals are wasting millions of taxpayer dollars on bloated Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs;

Whereas the Liberal government has wasted $1.049 billion on DEI bureaucracy while Canadians struggle to make ends meet;

Whereas research funding must reward the best ideas – not identity checkboxes;

Whereas by tying research funding to identity politics, the Liberals are undermining academic freedom, silencing dissenting voices, and eroding trust in Canadian institutions;

Whereas this Liberal government is out of touch, wasting billions on bureaucracy and ideological projects while Canadians face the highest cost of living in decades.

Therefore, we the undersigned support the Conservative plan to restore fiscal discipline, end the billion-dollar DEI bureaucracies, and put taxpayer dollars into services Canadians actually need.

    Source: DEI spending and government waste needs to DIE, Star article Diversity, equity and inclusion are coming under scrutiny — and Pierre Poilievre is ready to push the conversation

    Filed under DEI, Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

    ICYMI – Chan: Religious literacy can help Quebec balance identity and inclusion

    2025/10/15 Leave a comment

    Of course, this works both ways, the religiously devote also need secular literacy to engage meaningfully in a a pluralistic society:

    …In a world where religious and ideological polarization is growing, with three in 10 countries experiencing high levels of restrictions or social hostilities involving religion, religious literacy is not an academic luxury; it is a necessity. Over 84 per cent of the global population identifies with a religion, and, even in Quebec where laïcitéis cherished, religion continues to shape values and policies. As the Bouchard-Taylor Commission warned, “Ignorance of religious traditions fosters misunderstanding and social tension.”

    Religious literacy enables devout Quebecers to deepen their faith, helps the religious understand their cultural heritage and equips the secular with tools to engage meaningfully in a pluralistic society.

    Religious literacy addresses Quebec’s challenges with integration and polarization. As the province welcomes newcomers from diverse backgrounds – Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists and others – understanding their worldviews is critical for social harmony and cohesion. It helps deconstruct stereotypes surrounding religious and cultural practices and encourages constructive dialogue around accommodations. Through mutual understanding of the ABCs of belief systems, Quebecers can bridge divides, whether in cosmopolitan Montreal or rural regions with deep Catholic roots.

    To promote religious literacy, Quebec and Canada should integrate it into educational curricula and public awareness initiatives, empowering youth and adults to navigate diversity with empathy and awareness.

    W.Y. Alice Chan, PhD, is the executive director and co-founder of the Centre for Civic Religious Literacy, a non-religious, non-profit organization. She holds a master’s degree in teaching from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto and a doctorate in education from McGill University.

    Source: Religious literacy can help Quebec balance identity and inclusion

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