"Don't waste y our time telling the news media. They've been pimping for private think tanks for years. Don't bother telling home and school. They're useless. But the reality is there - and you're children may very well be suffering from it right now."

Actually, graeme, in BC, the BCTF together with school administrators and various school boards, have spoken in the media against school rankings and the standardized tests that lead to the rankings for several years now.  As a result, ever increasing numbers of parents are pulling their children from the tests;  if the trend continues, the school rankings  will lose even more credibility, as fewer and fewer children are tested.   One of the very, very few bright spots in public education in BC right now.

I'm glad to hear it.  My experience in the Atlantic region has been pretty frustrating. Everybody is pretty much in the dark about what's happening. And you can't break the news media because they're all scared of the big money behind the think tanks. In fact, that big money owns most of the news media.

I also hear that Quebec has taken a position against standardized testing and ranking.

But notice how few parents have responded to this thread? That's partly because most people have no idea what's at stake, and they've been heavily propagandized by the news media. This is quite a campaign that's sweeping across North America. In the US, it has resulted in a steep drop in what was always a low spot on the internation school totem pole.

The teachers' federations, the administrators, the professors of ed, the home and school down here haven't said a word. And they aren't going to.

Interesting. You can post in faith and religion with some idiot question like - Does God have feet? And if so, what does he walk on?

But while corporations are spending billions of dollars across Canada and  the US to draw us all in destroying public schools and setting up only private for profit ones, nobody cares.

Sorry. One. Thanks,Diana

I've been kind of wondering about this thread, too, graeme.   It's hard not to wonder if the lack of responses is because people don't really believe that the public school system is being deliberately undermined, or if they just don't care.  Either way, it's discouraging.

I'm not sure of the cause, either. In New Brunswick, there's a climate of fear of discussion of any public issues. The province has for generations been controlled by a small group of families, one of whom own all the newspapers. They are also very vindictive.

Teachers hate standardized testing, but even they are afraid to talk about it. Similarly, the education faculties of the universities know that its nonsense. But they have not  said a word. (I know what they think because I've talked to them.)  They contacted me to ask for my help in taking action. I agreed. That was a month ago. I have not heard from them since.

I think,since it involves the use of children for personal profit, it's a moral question. But the churches here wouldn't dream of challenging the dominant families.