School service centres across Quebec have stopped accepting new students for French-language classes due to financial uncertainty, leaving teachers across the province out of a job.
In Montreal, the Centre de services scolaire Marguerite-Bourgeoys (CSSMB) confirmed on Thursday it would cease enrolling new students for French-language classes at the start of the next session, putting an end to 12 teachers’ contracts.
“Currently, we do not know what solutions the [Education Ministry] MEQ or [Immigration Ministry] MIFI are considering to compensate for the shortfall,” a statement from the CSSMB reads. “Consequently, we have decided to stop registering new students at the start of the new session.”
The decision comes weeks after the Legault government capped funding for French-language courses as the province struggles to meet rising demand for classes.
Quebec’s Education Ministry is requiring school service centres not to exceed the funding levels allocated to French-language learning during the pandemic in 2020-21.
During a scrum at the National Assembly on Thursday, Education Minister Bernard Drainville cited the increase in immigration as the reason for capping funding for French classes.
“There’s a limit to what we can pay and there’s a limit, also, to what the taxpayer can pay,” Drainville said. “The number of people has exploded because of [Prime Minister] Justin Trudeau’s [immigration] policy. This is on him.”
Teachers denounce ‘dysfunction’ of language class system
French-language teachers in Quebec City are expected to protest Friday morning in support of about 30 teachers whose jobs were cut at Centre d’éducation des adultes Le Phénix.
Marie-Claude Choquette, vice-president of the teachers’ union Syndicat de l’enseignement des Deux Rives, said eliminating those positions will lead to several classes no longer being offered.
“We believed, apparently wrongly, that learning French was important to this government. It must review its decision and change course,” Choquette said in a news statement published Thursday.
Facing job loss, 40 French-language teachers at Outremont Adult Education Centre in Montreal — which is under the CSSMB — wrote to Immigration and French Language Minister Jean-François Roberge last week, bemoaning the “dysfunction” of the government’s current French-language-learning system.
In the letter signed by more than 200 Quebec French-language teachers, they criticized the government’s decision to redirect funding for adult education centres to the Immigration Ministry’s French-language classes and expressed concern over the fact that the government’s online portal to register for the classes is only available in French.
“We often have to deal with 15 mother tongues, three or four alphabets, migration traumas, disabilities, completely different education levels and complicated paths,” the letter said. “But we are qualified and experienced.”
Since January, there have been over 35,000 people waiting to sign up for French classes in the province.
The average wait time to register for a part-time course between April 1 to Aug. 30, 2024, was nearly 81 business days, according to the Immigration Ministry.
The Outremont Adult Education Centre serves 400 French-language students across 24 daytime and night classes.
Unlike online courses, adult education centres provide a community to students who go on cultural field trips throughout the year with their classmates — from visits to libraries to eating at a sugar shack, the teachers noted.
They added that they were “very concerned” about the prospect of the Immigration Ministry managing “the entire francisation process.”
In Trois-Rivières, at the Centre de services scolaire du Chemin-du-Roy, Syndicat de l’enseignement des Vieilles-Forges president Stéphan Béland said that the number of full-time French-language students at the organization dropped from 265 to 87 full-time students this year, and there are plans to cut the most advanced French classes.
Out of 12 teachers, three have been dismissed and others risk losing several hours of work, Béland said.
Classes necessary for integration, says language student
Afiqah Yusuf, a postdoctoral researcher at McGill University and French-language student at Outremont Adult Education Centre, said taking part-time language classes has been instrumental to her integrating into Quebec society after moving to the province from Malaysia 14 years ago.
She recently published opinion pieces in Montreal French-language newspapers Le Devoir and La Presse, advocating for funding language classes in adult education centres.
“I want to see others have the same opportunity to integrate fully with their neighbours and contribute to the cultural and social fabric in Quebec,” she said, noting that the government’s decision to remove financial incentives for students enrolled in part-time language classes presents a barrier for newcomers.
“I hope the government’s actions can align with what they espouse to prioritize, which is to protect the French language,” she said.
With files from Cathy Senay, Rowan Kennedy, Radio-Canada’s Sébastien Desrosiers and Sarah Laou, written by Holly Cabrera