The announcement of Bernard Drainville concerning the prohibition of cell phone at school causes strong reactions. A large majority of teaching staff already wanted to see such a ban, as indicated by a survey Led by the FSE two years ago. The recommendations of the Special Commission on the impact of screens will finally have been the momentum necessary to take action.
But this announcement is greeted by a good dose of skepticism in schools. The latter must already deal with more and more behavioral problems, often in a context where the workforce is insufficient. We simply try to survive the school year.
Many do not see how we will manage to manage this ban. Can we really imagine teachers running after young people in the school court to confiscate their phone, when it is difficult to manage them in class? We then added an additional layer by forcing the vouvoyer with regard to the staff.
Abandon
In an interview with QUB, Minister Drainville affirms that if a young person damages his school environment, he will be responsible for his compensation. Schools almost all already have sanctions for repairing gestures in their life code. The biggest obstacle to these sanctions? Parents who refuse that their precious cherub receives a restraint or performs community work, either because they blindly believe that their child is embodied, or because they see it as a form of humiliation, which would break the precious self -esteem of their perfect little darling.
Schools then quickly abandon these sanctions, because they do not judge the investment of profitable energy. School staff want to make a rigorous application of life codes, but the latter sometimes stood for a lack of support from decision -making bodies. So what will we now do with the one who is asked for a repair, but whose parent refuses? As long as we consider that we serve a school “clientele”, it will be difficult to enforce these regulations, because we know that the customer is always right.
The minister says that the sanctions will be “from warning to expulsion”! Really? Public schools are not even able to expel students who commit gestures of violence, intimidation and repeated insubordination. Can we really believe that we will go so far as to suspend a young person because he used his cell phone in the school courtyard or to expel him because he did not see his teacher?
Rigueur
This announcement starts from a desire to improve the school climate and the intentions are laudable. However, the government, which has the annoying tendency to want to centralize and control everything, dare to give schools full latitude to apply robust and rigorous disciplinary sanctions? Several, me the first, doubt it. Will CSS firmly support the decisions of repairs, suspensions or evictions of school departments or will they bow the spine at the slightest dispute of the “customer”? Implementing a regulation is easy. Highlighting it rigorously is less and requires a good dose of courage.
If the minister is sincere in his intentions, he must give a clear and indisputable watchword: schools are sovereign in their choices of sanctions and no longer have to fear displeasing their “customers”. We are ready to contribute to restoring a healthy, security and civical school climate, but we cannot fight this fight alone.
Making an ad is fine, now you have to make sure you be able to move from speech to acts.
Simon Landry
Teacher from the metropolitan region
Book author Education in Quebec in this 21e century.
Doctoral student in education at the University of Montreal
