Call it Bart Simpson's dream come true. A student gets to prepare his own report card, adding explanatory paragraphs that put the best possible spin on his marks. What's more, he is allowed to wait a year before showing the card to his parents.

No actual student boasts such privileges, of course, but B.C.'s Ministry of Education, Skills and Training does; it not only manages the province's state-run schools, but evaluates itself on the job it's doing too. Critics charge that, naturally enough, the ministry takes full, Bart-like advantage of its special position: it shades its "marks" to portray them in the best possible light, and then delays making its "report card" public.

The document currently in question is the ministry's annual report for school year 1995-96, which was released three weeks ago—a full year later than the School Act requires. Of greater concern than the tardiness, however, is the contradiction between the numbers the report recounts and the spin those statistics are given in accompanying text.

Given such shortcomings, it is not surprising the report has provided public-education activists with fresh ammunition in their ongoing assault on the state-run system. A major shake-up is due, they say, and it has to start with increased accountability to parents and better internal controls over the effectiveness of the ministry's own programs. Critics such as John Pippus of Surrey's Parent Network say Education Minister Paul Ramsey can start by ridding his ministry of the counter-productive mentality fostered by the discredited Year 2000 program, which was junked by former premier Mike Harcourt after a public uproar (see story, next page). Adds Liberal education critic April Sanders: "The minister should listen to people in the province. Not listening is why he is where he is right now—in Prince George, knocking on doors, fighting for survival." (Mr. Ramsey is the subject of a recall campaign, due to conclude next month.)

The 1995-96 annual report does not hesitate to boast about the academic performance of B.C. students. "In each of the past three international mathematics and science assessments," it states, "B.C. has outperformed most European and English-speaking countries, and has performed slightly below the top Asian countries."

Furthermore, B.C. students are outperforming students from around the world in programs offering advanced standing in college. And in national mathematics competitions, B.C. has consistently outperformed other provinces at each of the competing grade levels. More than 25% of the top mathematics teams in the 1995 Canadian mathematics competitions were from B.C. schools, even though B.C. had only 12% of the Canadian school-aged population. Even in comparison with its own past performance, B.C. appeared to do well in some areas. More students took Grade 12 provincial examinations in mathematics and the sciences in 1995-96 than ever before, and a greater percentage of students taking these examinations received letter grades of A and B, an achievement that capped a five-year trend.

The 1995-96 annual report also boasts that substantial gains have been made in the retention of students in Grades 8 through 12. The school-completion rate, including Dogwood diplomas and alternative high school completion credentials such as the General Educational Development Certificate was 85% in 1995-96, up 4% from 1993-94. Finally, the current completion rate for the standard Dogwood Diploma has improved substantially over the past 30 years, from 52% in 1965-66 to 71% in 1995-96, the highest on record.

Several areas of concern were noted, however. The 1995 assessment for Math 7 students showed a 2.3% decline since 1991. Similarly, the average score on common science assessment items dropped by 3% for students in Grade 4 science and 1.7% for students in Grade 7 science.

The report highlights the fact that almost all English as a Second Language students do better in school than students whose mother tongue is English. The highest rates came from students whose first language was Chinese, 89% of whom ended up with a Dogwood diploma. Students whose first language is Punjabi or French came second, with 78% of them graduating from Grade 12. In contrast, only 66% of those whose first language is English ended up with a Dogwood diploma.

How or why this is happening no one knows, because the ministry makes no effort to monitor the effectiveness of its own programs. For example, the report notes, "Despite the education system's efforts to improve students' preparation for employment, little is known about the effectiveness of these efforts."

The report is littered with such mea culpas. It admits that the effect of interventions on "at risk" students is not known. It states that "The effectiveness of aboriginal programs is also unknown," and reports that "The ministry has not collected data about the performance of students with special needs." In addition, the ministry admits that it does not monitor to ensure equitable distribution of funds within districts and that it has not developed performance outcome measures to determine the effectiveness of initiatives designed to improve relevance in education. Nor does the ministry monitor the extent to which schools follow their growth plans.

The admission of its failure to keep tabs on aboriginal programs is significant because many school districts with large numbers of Indian students are falling behind. Less than half the students in 10 districts—Keremeos, Golden, South Cariboo, Central Coast, Haida Gwaii-Queen Charlotte, Burns Lake, Alberni, Fort Nelson, Stikine and Nisgaa—complete high school.

Clearly, says Mr. Pippus, the annual report reveals that academically, B.C. schools are in decline, largely because the politicians and the teachers' union are oblivious to input from their primary clientele—parents. "The system is drifting without clear direction, purpose or accountability," he says.

Mr. Pippus, 47, acknowledges the report is, at least, "a more honest effort at telling it like it is than anything else produced in recent years." But that should be no surprise: it is the first to be released since 1996, when the Comptroller General took the Ministry of Education to task in a major report that demanded "measurable outcomes" and "standardized student evaluations." However, the B.C. Teachers' Federation (BCTF) rejected the report as "educationally unsound."

"Unfortunately," says Mr. Pippus, the result of the ministry's past dominance by the BCTF means that the latest annual report "is forced to fall back repeatedly on public-opinion surveys, focus group reports and other soft data." The BCTF media-relations office said last week that no spokesman was available to respond to the criticisms.

Mr. Pippus argues that the report is condescending to parents, the one stakeholder group that must be brought on side if public education is to prosper. And when the government does talk about choice, Mr. Pippus says, "It reminds me of Henry Ford's statement that the public could purchase any colour of car it wanted, so long as it was black." And that is simply not good enough when so much money is at stake. (The school system's operating budget for 1997-98 is $3.472 billion.)

"It's true that there's a lot of money spent without any testing to see how well it's spent, and that's not healthy," says David Robitaille, a professor of education at the University of B.C. and an international expert in testing. "As taxpayers, we have a right to know we are getting value for money spent."

The report recognizes that, "Seventy-six percent of British Columbians responding to a 1995 national public opinion poll on education felt that schools were graduating students with low levels of literacy and numeracy." However, it then appears to dismiss such concerns as nothing more than a problem in public relations. "Despite the strong performance of B.C. students," the report states, "parent and public perceptions do not appear to recognize the achievements students have made."

Liberal critic Sanders, a physician and a former school teacher, maintains that the ministry does a poor job of measuring those supposed achievements. "They don't do reports very well," she says. "I noticed right away, they don't measures goals or objectives, poor analysis, and poor mechanisms for evaluation."

Dr. Sanders says one of the first things that government must do is institute standardized provincial reporting of student performance. "We need reportings that reflect what parents want in correspondence with teachers," she says. "A parent should be able to compare student achievement directly between Vancouver and Peace River."

Mr. Pippus maintains that even the positive trends reported by the ministry may have non-educational causes. Students may be staying in school longer because the law was changed in 1989 to require an extra year's attendance. And a higher youth-unemployment rate means fewer jobs are available for drop-outs.

The widespread practice of social promotion, combined with grade inflation, may also be having an effect. From 1989-90 to 1993-94 the percentage of students receiving an A or B in English provincial examinations steadily declined, from 42.8% to 29.4%. But at the same time the number of As and Bs given out at the schools increased, from 40% to 45%.

As well, B.C.'s highly motivated Asian students are the reason the province does so well when compared to the rest of Canada on international tests, Mr. Pippus suggests. "How well would our provincial system do in comparison to other jurisdictions if this particular ethnic minority was not factored into the results?" he asks.

Mr. Pippus is not alone in suggesting that government take the public's concern over the quality of education seriously. Parents are voting their rejection of B.C.'s state-run system with their feet. Figures released two weeks ago show that independent school enrolment grew by about 26% over the past five years. During the same period, enrolment in B.C.'s public school system grew only about 10%.

In a paper read last August to an American Sociological Association meeting in Toronto, Neil Guppy, associate dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of B.C., and Scott Davies, professor of sociology at McMaster University, concluded that there is indeed a crisis of confidence in Canadian public education. Profs. Guppy and Davies recognize that parent-led groups are "less deferential toward the educational establishment and are more likely to feel entitled to challenge experts" in part because parent groups perceive the schools as having "failed to keep pace with modern educational needs." Core institutions are increasingly seen as "big, cumbersome and inefficient."

Faced with such evidence, the two professors state that "calls for more standardized tests, more school choice, more parental input into local public schools, and higher standards—all make sense in a cultural context of rising expectations." However, warn the professors, "to deny the existence of any negative trend is characteristic of many professional educators and entrenched bureaucrats." They particularly note that "teachers' unions have been very reluctant to admit that [public] confidence has been in widespread decline."

In many ways Mr. Pippus is the self-confident, self-taught epitome of Prof. Guppy's parent-leader who sees himself as "entitled to challenge experts." A videotape editor with 27 years' experience in television production, he makes a virtue of his lack of school-system credentials, arguing that his experience as a father of two, along with the intense study he has done since a teacher strike in 1993 forced him to take a greater interest in education, give him well-rounded insight into what is wrong with the system.

Funded by a Donner Canadian Foundation grant of $35,000 a year, the Parent Network acts as a resource for individuals and parent groups. Mr. Pippus organizes conferences, advises parents who are having problems, and monitors government and the BCTF. Much of what he discovers can be found on his website (www.enet.ca/parentnetwork).

Mr. Pippus, who was instrumental in the foundation of the Surrey Traditional School (an alternate school that operates within the public system) in 1994, says schools succeed where there is a strong sense of educational commitment and purpose; high expectations for academic work and behaviour; regular assessments of student behaviour; an orderly and pleasant school climate; a strong emphasis on teacher-centred instruction; and consistent efforts by home and school. "This is a list of basics that many people agree with," Mr. Pippus says, "but none of these will be effective unless parents are meaningfully represented in the school's ongoing administration."

"Schools have to reflect the wishes of parents, " agrees Prof. Robitaille, "but the problem is parents are not sufficiently involved. They're not taking advantage of the opportunities they already have."

That may be, but as recently as two weeks ago about 70 Chinese families were convened in Vancouver by CHMB radio announcer Hanson Lau to make plans for two traditional schools, one in Vancouver, the other in Richmond. Mr. Lau says the group believes it represents at least 400 families in both cities. "Parents are fed up with schools as they are now," he says. "Mainly it's the lack of discipline. But we also want a school that will prepare our kids to compete as adults."

Such parents would be far more welcome in a ministry of education run according to the dictates of Mr. Pippus. "The first thing I would do if I were minister of education," he says, "is get input from as many concerned parents as possible." But his second move would be to tap the talent already in the system. Mr. Pippus has dealt extensively with B.C.'s education bureaucracy for the past five years, and has learned that "there are some wonderfully subversive people" there. "I would give these people, some of whom are senior bureaucrats, more freedom to act."

To develop "an entrepreneurial educational culture" Mr. Pippus would create as many options for education as possible, both inside and outside the current system. If people currently outside the system can bring forward a new approach to education, along with a clearly defined method of accountability designed to demonstrate whether it was working, Mr. Pippus would fund it. "But I'm not really advocating privatization," he cautions.

In short, Mr. Pippus would do everything he could to give parents real choices for their children's education, including putting parents in charge of local schools if that is what they wanted. "These ideas sound radical only in B.C. and Canada," he says, pointing out that most of them have already been adopted in England and New Zealand, where polls show that confidence in public education, once much lower than in Canada, is growing.

"What I like about John," says Surrey School Board chairman Robert Pickering, "is that he stays away from politics and speaks to root problems. I support what he's doing wholeheartedly." Mr. Pickering notes that the only reason the board has not expanded the Surrey Traditional School is because of teacher opposition—"because it puts parents too close to the driver's seat. Parents should be in the driver's seat."

Education reformers may be gaining ground in the public arena, but not in government. According to Derek Sturko, director of evaluation and accountability for the Ministry of Education, devolution of school control, no matter how successful in other countries, is not on his agenda. "Beyond giving advice," he says, "parents and PACs [parent advisory councils] don't have much authority. And there is no movement to give them more binding powers." Nor, he reports, is there any impetus to force local schools to provide better statistics to allow parents to better evaluate their school's academic performance. Nor will recalcitrant school boards be pushed to meet parents' groups demands for more choices in education. "We believe they have a lot of choices already," he says, listing existing options, such as French Immersion, in the public schools, along with independent education and homeschooling.

"For most parents, public education is the only practical option," says Mr. Pippus. "To call independent schools a choice is to recommend a two-tiered system in which only a few can afford the benefits." To Mr. Pippus, it is obvious that B.C.'s government has forgotten that parents are a school's real clients. "A system isn't successful until parents feel comfortable sending their children there," he says. "Our government must learn to recognize and serve as many publics as possible with as many choices as possible."

—Shafer Parker Jr.

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