By Jill Cahoon
Alberta Representative on
National REAL Women of Canada Board
The Government of Alberta recently undertook an evaluation of the Alberta Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Act and made several changes in the process, as well as the qualifications of those administering the act to enable it to better represent Canadian Law.
It added a vital new provision, Section 11.1, in the proposed legislation that states that a parent or guardian of a child has a right to be notified in advance of any curriculum that explicitly teaches religion, sexuality or sexual orientation, and that the parents may take the child out of that part of the curriculum without academic penalty. This recognizes a parental right, in regard to a child’s education in sensitive subjects, as an enforceable human right.
This legislation does not apply to subjects that may indirectly relate to religion, such as women’s rights or the Holocaust, but addresses subject matter and curriculum that explicitly and specifically teaches religious doctrine, human sexuality and sexual orientation. If a student asks a random question during class related to religion, sexuality or sexual orientation, the teacher is still encouraged to assess and appropriately respond to the question as they do at present.
Teachers are angry over this provision. They argue that it is the responsibility of the school board to give parents notification of curriculum to be taught regarding religion, sexuality and sexual orientation, and not the teacher. However, under this amendment, teachers are required to respect the written request of a parent to opt their child out of the curriculum without penalty as per the notice sent out. The procedural changes made to the Act will make it very difficult for anyone, including parents, to bring frivolous charges against any individual, including teachers.
It will now be incumbent upon school boards to notify parents of the inclusion of these specified areas and encourage those responsible for curriculum to consider the rights of parents and the responsibility of school boards and teachers.
The Alberta Government recognized that parental rights are most appropriately treated as human rights. Article 26(3) of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that “parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.” If parental rights are important enough to be enshrined in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, they should be protected under our own human rights legislation. Government policy can change with every new Minister and Government and can also be greatly influenced by unelected bureaucrats in some instances. Thus, enshrining parental rights in legislation is a way of ensuring the rights of parents are adequately protected well into the future. This point is reinforced by the current state of affairs in British Columbia where the former Attorney General entered into an agreement with a homosexual couple to include homosexuality in all subject areas, and to eliminate the rights of parents to opt their children out of this curriculum. (See talk by Doris Darvasi, BC Board member of REAL Women of Canada, “The British Columba Homosexual Corren Agreement and its Aftermath”)
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