Opposition to French Immersion Cancellation Continues

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The battle against the New Brunswick provincial government's plans to cut french immersion in the bilingual province has two new members.

Bob Bernier is or make that was a longtime Liberal party supporter and worker. Bernier has quit over the government's decision to axe early French immersion.

The CBC report says that Bernier resigned last week as president of the Kings East Liberal riding association.

Bernier was to be a French supervisor in School District 6 near Saint John.

"The decision of eliminating early immersion is one of the reasons, but the real reason is the process the government went through to arrive at this decision. It's based on a report that's, at best, flawed and I didn't want my reputation tainted," Bernier said.

Bernier believes the government made the decision to kill the program long before it commissioned the report.

Bernier has made the charge that Education Minister Kelly Lamrock hired two "non-experts" to deliver a report that would allow the government to kill the program.

On another note, Lisa Weir, of Saint John, is worried that the changes that are being made to the education system will mean a loss of freedom of choice.

Weir wants he daughter who has special needs to continue to be educated in English.

The elimination of French immersion beginning in Grade 1 is not the only change the province has made. In addition the Liberals have has proposed a requirement that all students be enrolled in intensive French classes when they reach Grade 5.

Weir feels that this change will a disaster for her daughter, who is hearing and sight impaired, to be forced into an intensive French program next year. Weir has taken her objection to the province's ombudsman.

Her daughter's education goals are designed to improve her English skills with the goal of bringing her closer to the level of her classmates and to achieve this goal she needs help from a team of professionals.

"She has itinerant teachers for students who are deaf and hard of hearing, she has an itinerant teacher for students who are blind and visually impaired. There's speech language pathology involved, she has the support of an interpreter in the classroom. She has the support of a teacher's assistant in the classroom," Weir said.

"None of these people have French second-language training to work with an individual like my daughter."