A Bit More Detail

Despite guarantees in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, French-only schools in Toronto have historically been few and far between. For decades, a real fear for many francophones settling in Hogtown has been that they would fail to pass on their language and culture to their offspring.

A once-in-a-generation opportunity is starting to change that, and it promises a bigger cultural shift in Toronto. As enrolment in English-language schools declines, a crop of school properties is being put up for sale and the region’s two French school boards have jumped to buy. What no one predicted is the snowball effect that has followed each new school opening, drawing “invisible francophones” out of a reluctant assimilation and making new connections between them.

Lianne Doucet, a mother of three in Toronto’s Leslieville neighbourhood, laughs and lowers her voice to a spooky register. “We always say, ‘We’re all around you.’”

The cultural isolation of Toronto-area francophones – whether by mother tongue or schooling – can be so extreme that many don’t know that Section 23 of the Charter promises French-language K-12 education for their children. The Toronto area’s first French-language school board was created in 1988, and there are now two serving the region, one public and one Catholic. Still, nearly 30 years later, the secular board, the Conseil Scolaire Viamonde, must diligently advertise its schools to get the word out, superintendent Sylvie Longo said.

It has had a lot of ads to put out lately: 12 new schools in the past eight years, with four more under construction. The board’s Catholic counterpart, the Conseil Scolaire de District Catholique Centre-Sud, has opened 10 in the same time span. The two boards’ enrolment rose respectively by 33 and 16 per cent from 2008 to 2014.

That’s in sharp contrast with the shrinking English system. The Toronto District School Board’s enrolment dropped by nearly 5 per cent in the same period.

And still, French schools consistently fill up faster than predicted. École Élémentaire La Mosaïque opened in Toronto’s Danforth area in 2008 and has already had to rezone, unable to fit in all the eligible children. École Ronald-Marion in Pickering opened in 2013 and now needs portable classrooms to meet demand, while a French Catholic school in Stouffville is at full capacity and hasn’t even opened yet.

“When we build schools, they come,” Ms. Longo said.

Toronto may be one of the world’s most diverse cities, but within Canada, it’s also a bastion of English – and Quebec, a more obvious destination for francophone immigrants, is just a few hours away. Who are the tens of thousands of Toronto-area residents itching for all-French education?

It was once Canada’s Fifth Avenue, the frontline of the retail sector in what was known a century ago as the country’s commercial metropolis.

Standing sentry were department store giants like Ogilvy, Birks and Scroggie, which turned Montreal’s then-residential Ste-Catherine Street into the country’s pre-eminent shopping district. Nearly 100 years later, with the retail shopping sector in turmoil, downtown stores losing business to suburban supermalls, and aging infrastructure that is starting to fail, Montreal is getting a rare chance in the life of a metropolis as it prepares to remake a major artery almost from scratch.

As this city braces for the official plan to be unveiled later this week by Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre, there is excitement about the possibilities but also trepidation for those who make their livelihoods running Ste-Catherine Street bars, boutiques and restaurants.

[. . .]

Before Montreal's Ste-Catherine Street was the city's major retail artery, it was primarily a residential area. In the remake of the street, seen here at Metcalfe Street in 1898, city officials say they want to bring back some of the greenery that has been lost to urbanization.

[. . .]

The plan to be announced this week could revolutionize what is an already iconic — through fairly traditional — downtown strip. The city has collected nearly three dozen submissions from individuals and associations with options such as doing away with street parking, installing heated sidewalks to melt winter snow, making extra space for patios and commercial kiosks, and even designating car-free zones to turn a shopping district into a pedestrian paradise.

Ford says he’s against the provincial Liberals’ revised sex-ed plan because he has two kids in Grade 2 and Grade 4 who “should not be talking about what anal sex is” or what oral sex entails.

According to the new curriculum, however, kids will be in Grade 7 and 8 before they discuss anal and oral sex, as well as contraception, preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections.

Students in Grade 2 will be learning about the stages of development and related body changes, and the concept that “no means no.”

By Grade 3, students will learn about same-sex relationships and children in Grade 4 will learn more about the dangers of online bullying.

Ford — who once made reference to oral sex on live television — says he told his children to walk out of class if they start being taught about anal or oral sex.

Thorncliffe Park elementary school, in a predominantly Muslim area of Toronto, reported attendance on Monday of 130, according to the Toronto District School Board — 130 out of 1,350 students. That’s just nine per cent who showed up, though on Tuesday it had rebounded … all the way to 16 per cent.

At nearby Valley Park Middle School — best known for controversially hosting congregational Muslim prayers in its cafeteria on Fridays — Monday attendance was just 38 per cent.

Their parents are mad as hell about Ontario’s new sexual education curriculum, and they’re boycotting the entire curriculum, for up to a week, as a result.


Five years ago, when then-premier Dalton McGuinty abandoned much the same curriculum, conservative Christians were generally considered the culprits or heroes, depending on one’s standpoint. And they’re still on the warpath against the curriculum, which with a few tweaks is finally set to go into effect for the next school year.

But the school boycott is a multicultural affair, and the most stunning absenteeism numbers reportedly come from the Muslim community, which was not nearly so prominent in the 2010 debate.

Reports from a Monday protest in Thorncliffe Park suggest concerns range from the specific (introducing the notion of “gender fluidity,” too early or at all) to the conspiratorial (accusing the government of “indoctrinating children with a minority lifestyle”) to downright apocalyptic: freelance journalist Javed Zaheer warns of the “total destruction” of his grandchildren’s generation.

Standing against the wall of the crowded Leku Ona (Good Place) bar, Dave Asumendi took a sip of his wine as he watched a group of young people dancing in circles, moving to the music of a band that kept switching between Basque folk songs and accordion-infused Johnny Cash tunes.

It was Thursday night on Boise’s Basque Block, a small stretch of Basque-American businesses and cafes in Idaho’s capital. Asumendi had just arrived from the intermediate Basque language course taught at the cultural center across the street.

“It’s always been a lifelong burn to learn the language,” he said.

Asumendi, whose grandparents immigrated to the United States from Spain, is one of the many Basque-Americans who have mobilized to learn their unique ancestral tongue, which now has fewer than 1 million speakers worldwide. In recent years, the autonomous Basque government in Spain has invested significantly in language education, looking to boost the number of Basque speakers in Spain and in Basque diaspora communities.

One of the least likely beneficiaries of that largesse has been Idaho, which hosts one of the most active and vibrant communities of Basque-Americans in the U.S. and one where many community members are dedicated to keeping the language going. There are Basque classes for all ages and abilities — often taught by teachers paid by the Basque regional government — and even a Basque immersion preschool, plus a Basque studies department at Boise State University.

Idaho has the highest percentage of Basque speakers in the U.S. and is home to five of the top nine counties where Basque is spoken. In two of those counties — Lincoln and Owyhee — Basque is the third-most-common language spoken in the home, after English and Spanish.

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[S]ome experts worry the increasing creation of an immigrant underclass will brew trouble — sadly ironic in a region that for decades has taken pride in and built a reputation on its multiculturalism and acceptance of immigrants from around the world. By 2017, the GTA is forecast to become home to a predominantly non-European population.

A recent backlash over the Royal Bank of Canada’s move to replace Canadian workers with foreign workers, and a battle in Brampton over a townhouse development that erupted along cultural lines with accusations of shady “Indian politics,” reveal simmering tensions. And the Conservative Party’s recent attempt to crack down on abuses to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program has done little to appease critics.

“While immigrants and immigration is the heart and soul of the country, if you look at the main basis of inequality in Canada, along with gender, it’s based on race and immigrant status,” said Yogendra Shakya, senior research scientist at Access Alliance.

“Racialized immigrants are facing two to three times the rate of unemployment, higher representation in precarious, contract, on-call or temporary jobs. They are two to four times more likely to be underemployed and have more than double the rates of education level in terms of having post-secondary education.”

Shakya has witnessed the widening inequality and growing frustration at his agency’s clinics. New immigrants often can’t find work in their field and end up in temporary low-paying jobs, often through temp agencies. This precarious work has led to higher rates of poverty among immigrants across the GTA.

Further complicating the picture are temporary workers — often brought in under the temporary workers’ program or under international student visas — who choose to stay here after their visas expire and become part of the undocumented in the city. What’s more, new emerging communities, with perhaps 3,000 to 4,000 people in them, of immigrants from Nepal, Bhutan, Central Asia and parts of Africa such as Cameroon, are also beginning to emerge across the GTA.

Driven by a better living environment, bigger and more affordable homes in the suburbs, more newcomers are settling in the 905 areas as older immigrant communities matured, moved out of the city and reached a critical mass in certain outlying neighbourhoods.

The Jewish community, for example, has taken hold of the Bathurst corridor from Lawrence Ave. to Centre St. in Thornhill, the Chinese in Scarborough, Markham and Mississauga, Italians in Vaughan and Indians in Brampton.

While there are still religious institutions and ethnic businesses dominating the old enclaves in the city, for many they are now little more than tourist attractions and places of reminiscence. (There are also residential clusters of impoverished immigrants who can’t afford the suburban dream.)

“The Greektown is not Greek; Chinatown is not Chinese. They are just ethnic business enclaves where you go, eat, play, have fun and go home,” said Ryerson University professor Sandeep Agrawal, an expert on ethnic enclaves and urban planning.

According to Shuguang Wang, a demographics geographer at Ryerson University, many ethnic enclaves in the 905 have become “multi-centric,” meaning a dominant group has more than one cluster, often surrounding an ethnic mall or plaza, in a single municipality, sharing the space with mixed neighbours.

“These businesses may be owned and operated by the Chinese and viewed as ethnic businesses, but they are not only targeting Chinese clients,” said Wang.

“Sometimes because of city planning and zoning, not all areas can get permits for development. People cannot start their own enclave and have to add to the existing,” added Wang, explaining the emergence of mixed ethnic hubs in the 905.

Many ethnic retailers now reach out to a multicultural clientele, he said. Sunny Foodmart, a Chinese-owned grocery chain, for example, sells Halal meat at its Flemingdon Park store to cater to the area’s Muslim residents.