Commission Publication
February 1998
| ...continued Responsibility is Shared for Education Equity | ||
| After public consultation, the Commission released its Education Equity Report in September 1985. The report concluded Aboriginal students did not receive the same benefits and opportunities from the educational system as their non-Aboriginal classmates. It noted the alienation of Aboriginal students in the classroom and the lack of Aboriginal role models. It stated equality of education required more than an equal opportunity to enter the educational system. Students are unlikely to succeed if they feel like outsiders in schools that fail to meet their needs or allow discriminatory behaviour.
The Commission recommended education equity programs to address the problem, stating: "What has occurred is the development of systems built around the needs of the majority culture and a failure to recognize, until recently, that the needs of minority cultures are being bypassed. Education equity calls upon the education system to recognize those different needs and respond to them." In 1985, the Commission asked school divisions with five percent or more Aboriginal students to develop education equity programs for approval. Eighteen school divisions are now benefitting from equity programs (covering approximately 77,500 students, roughly 40 percent of K-12 students in the province). |
Scott referred to the work school divisions have already done as the "first stage" of education equity. "We encourage them to consider ways to build on what they have already accomplished by expanding their equity programs to include all children."
 Donalda Ford (centre), Assistant Director of the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission, and Craig Dotson, Deputy Minister of Education, chat with an unidentified participant at the event launching the document Our Children, Our Communities and Our Future. The new policy and planning document will guide the development of education equity in Saskatchewan's schools. | |
| Changes Underway for Employment Equity Monitoring | ||
| Although the number of equity plans in the province continues to go up every year, the number of Commission staff who monitor the programs has remained the same. To cope with the increasing workload, the Commission's two employment equity advisors will no longer monitor the province's employment equity programs on a yearly basis - instead, equity programs will be assessed once every three years.
This year, it's the turn of the province's Crown corporations and the Treasury Board corporations. Donalda Ford, assistant director, said the change in process will allow for a more detailed monitoring of the plans. "Employers will be asked to respond to a survey that will give a picture of their employment equity activities and accomplishments. The purpose of the survey is to see if there are ways we can help make equity initiatives more effective and efficient." |
Ford said another benefit of monitoring a smaller group of employers every year is that it will allow for a more comprehensive assessment of the plan's effectiveness by the community. The format of the employment equity seminar has been changed this year to allow for input from community groups interested in the effectiveness of the province's employment equity plans.
In May, staff and community groups will work together to review the annual reports of the organizations being monitored that year. They will then formulate questions that will serve as the focus of round-table discussions at the employment equity seminar on June 24. The round-table discussions will take place in the morning. The afternoon will be an information session for the equity employers. They'll be given the opportunity to share success stores with their counterparts and to discuss effective employment equity initiatives. | |