Accessibility & streaming: why Johnny can’t read

Accessibility to higher education is as frustrating as
any dream gone wrong can be. The problems of acces-
- Sibility, have their roots very early ina child’s education.

For many qualified working class students there are no
8vailable choices. Finances, environment, and discrim-
_ ination work to frustrate the fulfilment of their talents.
— Similar problems of access are found for women, cul-

tural minorities, and the disabled.

Accessibility refers to equal use of education by all
_ &conomic classes and social strata. In Canada, 75-80 per
_ ent of higher education costs are paid out of public
funds. More than just a moral principle, the working
Class which bears so much of the burden of funding
Should receive proportional benefit but working class
youth are strikingly underrepresented in the university
and college population.

Accessibility is not thought to be a problem in elemen-
_ lary and secondary education because of the universality

of education guaranteed by a free public education sys-
tem. Anyone wanting education has it for the asking.
Just below the surface of this rather optimistic view of
things lies another reality.

_ The organization of public education in many

Capitalist countries is dominated by certain notions of
Juman intelligence which sees all of humanity in terms of
Mnate and fixed intellectual abilities, some of greater and

| Some of lesser abilities and the majority somewhere in

the middle. Pubilc ‘education, therefore, is given a
Mission to perform, not only of instilling in each student
Some basic standards of education, but to identify, pre-
Pare and promote that proportion of the student
Population which has the ‘‘natural’’ ability to benefit
_ Tom higher education.
“ In countries such as England, identification of varying
levels”’ of intelligence begins at a very early age. Once
Classified , students are separated into various
Streams”’, each of which receives education of a higher
or lower standard according to the child’s classification.
(iS practice is quite simply called “‘streaming’’ or
tracking’’.
Critics of streaming raise several points which are
Televant to the issue of accessibility:
_ Much evidence exists to show that a child’s intel-
- ligence is not fixed but varies over time. Ethnicity and
Social class background of students are barriers to edu-
_ “ational progress more so where the sorting progress
Segins at early ages. The methods of measuring intel-
‘J8ence are biased towards such academic skills as read-
Ing, writing, or mathematics. Children from working
Class or immigrant backgrounds tend to be lower in
developing these skills because of environmental differ-

_ Nees. By the time a working class child “‘blooms”’ _

&cademically he or she is already on a dead-end track.

i Falsified Data
Sir Cyril Burt, an ‘influential English educational
Psychologist, laid the theoretical ground work for
ing in the 1930s with his research. It claimed that

| Orking class children were inherently inferior intellec-

c. The English school system was dominated by this
to Ty for 30-years. After his death, Burt was discovered
- ‘Ohave falsified essential data to ‘prove’ his theories.
the 1930s the Soviet Union widely practiced mental
et fasurement but in time noted the inherent discrim-
i aay effect it had on working class children. In 1936, it

ice the practice of intelligence testing and since then
;,_-oncentrated on the learning process and ways of
ofnoving educational attainment across all categories
Ration atonal achievers. The results have won the admi-

n of educators around the world.

A shameful episode

R
can Over two decades,

ben visa students in many Canadian

- ing vinces have been subjected to differential fees vary-

de from 150 to 300 per cent higher than Canadian stu-
Nts are required to pay. ;

| fre. Provincial governments which have instituted dif-

x tinetial fees for foreign students claim that the addi-

PRcaRe money is needed to offset increased education
fj Sts and to make up for the money not received from
; me students in taxes. Such arguments are easily
mh Ven false. Local economic impact surveys have de-
leyastrated that post-secondary communities with high
vel of visa enrollment benefit substantially from the
alec * Of foreign exchange. Provincial governments are
nee Shown to increase their revenue through indirect
€S generated by the presence of foreign students.
“deal its heart, the differential fees issue concerns the
Pring} commitment of provincial governments to the
the; Iple of quality, accessible education. It is clear that
for .uPosition of visa fee differentials is a useful device
Drosy“emments to promote the new “‘user pay ap-
Dolioy."y {All students are ultimately vulnerable to this
bend: it Should be added that Canada has historically
Steettted from generations of Canadians who have
No abroad without facing visa fee differentials.
does have a debt to pay in this respect.

In Canada, the orientation to streaming persists. The
Ontario ministry of education is making significant
changes in elementary and secondary education sup-
posedly in response to public concern over declining
standards of education in the ‘‘basics’’ (reading, writing,
and mathematics). An essential part of this scheme to
upgrade standards is to make the streaming process even
more rigid. Thus the ministry proposes to increase stan-
dards of education in the ‘‘lower’’ educational streams
but is hitching this improvement to a process which will
reduce the number of university bound students and
‘compel students to make and stick to employment deci-
sions at a young age.

In an era of declining educational resources through
cutbacks, it remains to be seen how an increase in stan-
dards is to be carried out. More likely, Ontario will be left
with only the rhetoric of ‘“‘back to basics’? and the
discriminatory system of streaming even more firmly
entrenched.

Fiscal Restraint and Access

Accessibility in the world of the administrator, is one
of education’s holy trinity, the “‘access, quality, fund-
ing’ triangle. Provincial ministries have taken some
trouble to impose on the public its peculiar and conserva-
tive version of public finance. Of the three points of the
triangle, only two — access and quality — are deemed
flexible. Therefore one has two unattractive options:
sacrifice positions to preserve quality (i.e., smaller clas-
ses, etc.) or maintain access at the expense of quality.

AT THE BEGINNING OF THEIR EDUCATIONS, ALL
STUDENTS START OVT EQUAL. ALMOST...
1. Rica stuvenc 2~ WORKING CLASS STUDENT

BRAINS + SVMULAR

BUT AROUND GRADE B, A PROCESS kwon AS
STREAMING TENDS To OCCUR... WORKING
Chas$ STUDENTS ARE OFTEN DISCOURAGED,
OR UNMABLE,TO ENTER ACADEMIC COURSES
OF STUDY... TO KEEP THEM WORKING CASS,

The public has become so intimidated by the fiscal
conservatives’ overbearing attitude about ‘“‘wasteful
public spending’’ that few question the key to the access,
quality, funding straight-jacket, that is, funding restraint
is not an unalterable economic necessity. Fiscal restraint
is a policy option and as we well know from experience,
government policy can change.

In capitalist ‘‘democracies’’, prices are most often
used as the means of rationing commodities. Canadians
are becoming alarmed at the intrusion of this philosophy
into the arena of publicly funded social services. Lower
income households cannot compete with middle and
upper income households for such basic needs as health,
housing, food, clothing, and education. Yet government
policies of fiscal restraint, through user fees on publicly
funded services, are forcing working class families to
accept lower social standards or even choose between
necessities. It is not surprising that working class
families see sponsorship of a son or a daughter in colle
or university as a luxury. ;

The combination of financial barriers with enrolment
restrictions for universities and colleges is rapidly mak-

’ ing the education system a preserve for the wealthy. An

open-ended post-secondary system, such as was advo-
cated in the 1960s at least had the virtue of giving those
who were shut out of higher education early in their
education, a chance to eventually prove their intellectual
worth. This policy is being substituted with a doctrine
which emphasizes ‘‘Education is not a right, it is a pri-

_vilege’’ — a less than democratic sentiment.

“BAK A
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zh

| ACCESSABILITY
| 1S SOMETHING
OF A MYTH
FoR MANY
STUDENTS.

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For the working class student who
manages to break through the ele-
mentary and secondary education
barriers, there are still hurdles to
clear at the entry point to university.
Increased tuition costs form an im-
mediate financial and psychological
barrier.

Student aid programs are meant to
provide for these students but are

not designed for easy use. Almost all -

aid programs are means tested, sub-
jecting the student to a red tape
jungle of regulations and minimum
standards. Rather than paying actual
educational costs, the programs give
students some mix of grant and loan
according to arbitrarily determined
allowances for living costs, books
and tuition. Since the allowances are
not indexed, they are quickly eroded
through inflation. Depending on the
region, these allowances may be as
much as 52 per cent below real
costs. '

Tuition increases are not the only
cost increase demanded from stu-
dents. Administration fees are now
standard in every institution. These
include costs for every conceivable
form that a student completes — and
there are many; astronomical fees
for overdue library books; additional
compulsory fees for health and athle-

IT’S BEEN RUMOURED, 4s well, THAT YOUR
CHANCE S OF FINDING A JOB ARE INVERSELY
PROPORTIONAL 10 YOU QUALIFICATIONS.« +

IY WASN'T ALUAYS

Student aid: benefit or barrier?

tic services; and many others that
were previously considered a part of
a student’s registration.

Living costs are just as insur-
mountable. Current levels of un-
employment mean summer jobs
cannot provide sufficient savings for
the eight months of education. Stu-
dents from working class families
cannot count on financial support
from parents as students from upper
class families can.

Student loans generally move with
interest rates. Some students were
unfortunate enough to have to begin
paying back loans when interest
rates were high.

Students who get approval for
loans often have difficulty in
negotiating them. Chartered banks
have introduced measures to com-
plicate loan procedures. For the past
two years, the Toronto Dominion
Bank has been a leader in the restric-
tion of funds for student loans. When
the money ran out, students were
tumed away. .

This happened at a time when de-
mand for student aid was on the rise.
In Ontario, applications increased
by 25 per cent over the past two
years. The federal government
acknowledges that this was a pres-
sure tactic by the banks to force

o.WHICH MAKES PAYING Back THAT STUDENT

LOAN A CAREER IN ITSELE/ “>
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Tic GOVERNMENT 1S TIRED OF DISHIVG OUT

TO GGT TIRED OF DRSWING MONGY OUT TO

government to base student loan
interest rates on the highly unstable
floating prime rate. With govern-
ment guaranteeing the loans, the
banks are hardly losers in this
arrangement. ;
Student loans, in themselves, are
no source of comfort for disadvan-
taged students. In Alberta, where
there is an all loan — no grant, aid
program, loan limits of $4,300 annu-
ally can add up to $20,000 before a
student receives his Bachelor’s de-

Recent employment statistics in- —
dicate that unemployment is becom-
ing more uniform across all levels of —
educational attainment. In other
words, graduates no longer can
count on getting a job and paying off
their loans. Many are forced into de-
faulting under the burden of debt.
Others are discouraged from be-

ginning.

Student aid programs should be
the cornerstone for any policy of im-
proving accessibility for working
class students. The first step is the
elimination of tuition fees and a pro-

- vision for the indexation of living al-

lowances in an all-grant aid program
or the payment of actual costs. This
would be a serious first step in break-
ing down the barriers.

Monet TO STUDENT. BUT THEy weVBR seem