Chapter 4 GOING TO SCHOOL

The Right—and the Duty—to Attend School

In Canada (as in many other countries), everyone has the right to free public schooling. For example, section 32(1) of Ontario’s Education Act states: “A person has the right, without payment of a fee, to attend a school in a school section, separate school zone or secondary school district, as the case may be, in which the person is qualified to be a resident pupil.” This is followed by several sections that explain in detail how a “resident pupil” is defined—but the point is that you’re expected to attend a school in the school district where you and your parents live.¹ This is generally the case in Canada, although in some places (such as Alberta) or in special circumstances, you may be allowed to attend a school somewhere else.

Your right to free public schooling lasts until you finish high school: it doesn’t necessarily end when you reach a certain age. In Ontario, for example, there’s no limit on the number of years you can spend in high school (although there is an upper limit to the number of course credits you can earn). Moreover, even though most people complete middle school around the age of 13 or 14, you have the legal right in Ontario to attend elementary (primary and middle) school until you turn 21—and if your birthday falls before the last day of school in June, you have the right to stay in school until the end of the school year. Once you graduate from high school, though, you’re not entitled to free post-secondary education. Universities and colleges are restrictive, in the sense that they can choose whom to admit—and, even though, in Canada, most universities and colleges are public institutions (that is, they are funded partly by the government), they generally require students to pay tuition.²

Although you have a right to education, you are not given a choice about whether to exercise this right. No matter where in the country you live, education is compulsory up to a certain age. As a general rule, compulsory education begins in the year that a child turns 6. In most of Canada, you must stay in school until you turn 16 (unless you manage to graduate from high school earlier); the exceptions are Manitoba, New Brunswick, Nunavut, and Ontario, where the school-leaving age has been raised to 18. In some cases, you may leave earlier–mainly if you have already completed the minimum number of credits to graduate. There can be consequences for both you and your parents if you don’t go to school—although, of course, you can miss specific days if there’s a good reason, such as illness. According to section 30(1) of Ontario’s Education Act, for instance, your parents or guardians face a fine of up to $200 if they fail to make sure you’re at school, at least until you turn 16. And, according to section 30(5), a student who is at least 12 and under 16 and who regularly refuses to attend school commits an offence and is liable either to be fined or to be put under probation (in which case the student must abide by the rules of the probation order). “Why only until the age of 16, if the school-leaving age is 18?” You may be asking at this point. The answer lies in a slight quirk in the law. When the school-leaving age was raised to 18 in Ontario, the intention was to provide for similar penalties pertaining to students who have turned 16 but are not yet 18. However, these penalties have yet to be incorporated into the Education Act—so, as matters presently stand, the courts have little ability to enforce the law that students must remain in school until they turn 18.

Even when you do reach the school-leaving age, you may not be able to drop out right on your birthday: you may have to wait for the end of the school year. To use our example of Ontario again: section 21(1)(b) of the Education Act says that you must remain in school until the last school day in June in the year in which you turn 18. But this also means that you can leave school before you actually turn 18 if your birthday happens to fall after the last school day in June in that year.

Education Options

Even though education itself is compulsory, not all schools are public schools—that is, schools that are paid for by the government. Other options do exist:

• Private schools: These are run by private citizens outside the public education system, and your parents must pay to enrol you in such a school. Each school makes its own rules about who can attend, and private schools often have other special rules—for example, about school hours or whether students must wear a school uniform. The school curriculum may also differ a little from the standard public school curriculum. However, private schools must operate within certain rules set by law, and their teaching must meet standards set by the province.

• Religion-based schools: These are schools that are affiliated with a particular religion. These schools exist for people who believe that education should include religious or spiritual instruction. In addition to various Christian schools, there are, for example, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and Sikh schools. For the most part, these schools are private, and whether they receive any funding from the government depends on the province in which they are located. However, Alberta, Ontario, and Saskatchewan, as well as the Northwest Territories and the Yukon, have separate Catholic or Protestant schools that are part of the public system, and you can attend them for free, even if your family isn’t Catholic or Protestant. This may involve a family designating their taxes to go to the separate school system.

• Homeschooling: All provinces and territories allow parents to educate their children at home themselves instead of sending them to school, but the rules for doing so differ from place to place. In Nova Scotia, for instance, parents who wish to educate their children at home have to register with the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development; in Newfoundland and Labrador, they need to get permission from the school district. In order to receive a high school diploma, however, a homeschooled child must take GED (General Educational Development) exams—that is, high school equivalency exams.

There are also different options within the public system, depending on what part of Canada and what school district you live in. For example, there are alternative schools for young people who want to focus on special talents; at the secondary school level, there are traditional high schools, some technical and trade schools, and other schools with apprenticeship programs. Some high schools offer co-op programs that make it possible for students to work part-time to earn credits toward their diploma while at the same time gaining valuable work experience. Also, by the time you reach the secondary level, not all subjects are compulsory. A typical Canadian high school offers a range of elective subjects, so you can, to some extent, choose your own study program. This is especially true in big cities, which generally have more schools and programs available than a small community can offer.

Do I have any control over the education I get?

If you have all these choices, can you make any of them yourself? The written law of many provinces doesn’t clearly answer the question of whether children or parents have the power to make these choices. Usually, though, the people who run schools tend to assume that parents have the power to make decisions for their minor children.³ Normally, then, you need a parent or guardian to enrol you in school. As long as your parents respect the laws on compulsory education, they can decide which school to enrol you in, and they can also take you out of the school you are enrolled in.⁴ (In fact, in Québec, sections 4 and 239 of the Education Act specifically say that until you are 18, your parents have the right to choose your school from the ones administered by your local school service centre). Even on the relatively minor and very personal question of which elective subjects to take, your school may want your parents to approve your choices unless you are an adult student.⁵ This is general information; we can’t tell you exactly what a given school would do if a minor student, especially one in high school, wanted to make a choice that differed from his or her parents’ choice. Some schools in some places might allow minor students the power to make their own, independent choices about which school to attend or which subjects to take (and you can always check this with your school or school board), but many schools will not (unless a court orders them to; see what we wrote in the previous chapter about challenging your parents’ decisions in court).

However, there is at least one situation in which you should be able to take control of your own educational choices. As we explained in chapter 3, in most provinces, you can withdraw from your parents’ control once you reach the age of 16 and establish your independence, or under some circumstances, live with someone other than your parents. In this case, even though you are still a minor, you may qualify as an “independent student.” For example, Alberta defines an independent student as one who is either 18 or older (that is, legally an adult) or 16 or older and living independently as determined by the board of education in accordance with the Education Act or is a party to an agreement under section 57.2 of the Child, Youth and Family Enhancement Act. Such a student is entitled to the same rights and benefits and is subject to the same obligations as his or her parents, “and the student’s parent shall not exercise those rights, receive those benefits or be subject to those obligations” (Education Act, ss. 1[1][n] and 6[2]). Similarly, in New Brunswick, an “independent pupil” is one who has reached the age of 19 (the age of majority in that province) or is living independently of his or her parents (Education Act, s. 1).⁶

If you are no longer under parental control, you should be able to enrol in school, stay enrolled, and choose the subjects you will study without having to get your parents’ approval. If you withdraw from parental control while you are still in school, you should immediately go to your principal and let him or her know that you have done so. You should explain that you intend to make your own decisions about your schooling and ask the school not to let your parents do so in your place. Not all schools will be familiar with the idea of withdrawing from parental control. If a school refuses to enrol you or otherwise allow you to make decisions about your education, even though you have legally left home, you should get a lawyer to help you. You may need to write your principal a letter stating your intention to be an independent student.⁷

If you and your parents disagree about education choices, it can help to go to your school’s principal or guidance counsellor, who may be willing to talk with your parents. By the time you reach high school, your school principal and guidance counsellor are more likely to be willing to try to intercede in such conflicts. Especially in cases where they feel that your preference was based on good reasons and/or that your parents are behaving in an arbitrary fashion. You might also be able to find support in the form of mediation services, services that are available in some provinces through the education system.

As a general rule, your parents are entitled to view the records your school keeps about you. In Ontario, both you and your parents have the right to examine your student records; after you turn 18, only you have the right to do so (Education Act, s. 266[3]). In some situations, the school might wish to share information with your parents (for example, about a suspension), but if you are over 16 and have withdrawn from parental control, you may be able to prevent the school from doing so.

Depending on where you live, you might have an opportunity to influence decisions about school policy. In a number of provinces, school boards are allowed to have “student trustees”—students who attend meetings of the board to represent the interests of students. They can take part in discussions and give voice to student wishes and concerns, although they generally don’t have the same status as regular members of the board. In Ontario, for example, a student trustee can suggest a motion but not actually move one; neither can a student trustee cast a binding vote on a motion, although he or she can require that the board vote on a matter under discussion (Education Act, s. 55). In Québec, Secondary Cycle Two schools (grades 9 through 11) are required to allow students to form a student committee that collaborates in developing and implementing the school’s educational program and can also make suggestions about how the school operates. In addition, these committees appoint student representatives to sit on the school’s governing board—or, if no such committee or student association exists, then the principal must arrange for the election of student representatives (Québec Education Act, ss. 96.5, 96.6, and s. 51). This system has the advantage of giving students a voice at the level of individual schools.

School Rules

Any school will have a set of rules that students must follow. These rules will differ in their details, which will largely depend on what makes sense to the adults who run your local schools. Provincial or territorial education laws may also provide some guidance to schools about how to set rules. In Ontario, for instance, there is a province-wide code of conduct for schools, authorized by section 301(1) of the Education Act. In addition, according to sections 302(1) and 302(2), every school board is responsible for setting a code of conduct for its schools, as well as its own rules for disciplining students.

Can the school impose a dress code or uniform?

Rules about students’ appearance exist in many schools. Ontario’s Education Act authorizes the Minister of Education to require a public school board to make rules about “appropriate dress” for students (s. 302[5]). The dress codes of many schools don’t limit you all that much, but many private schools, many of Ontario’s separate schools, and a few public schools have chosen to make their students wear uniforms. Adults will give you all sorts of reasons why they think it’s a good idea to deny you the freedom to choose your own clothes in the morning, despite the fact that millions of people have managed to get a good education while attending schools that didn’t tell them what to wear. It could be argued that school uniforms, at least in the public system, go against your Charter right to freedom of expression, guaranteed in section 2(b); however, a Canadian court has yet to decide on the issue in this way.

One thing that the law is clear on, however, is that dress codes must not violate your freedom of religion, as guaranteed in section 2(a) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The courts have ruled that students are entitled to wear items of religious dress, such as Jewish yarmulkes, Muslim hijabs, or Sikh turbans. Even the right to wear the Sikh curved dagger, or kirpan—which technically qualifies as bringing a weapon to school—was upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada in Multani v. Commission scolaire Marguerite-Bourgeoys (2006 SCC 6 [CanLII]), although the case suggests that the school may impose reasonable safety rules on the wearer.

Can the school open my locker?

Yes, if the school has a good reason to believe that you may be hiding something illegal or dangerous. Ordinarily, as we will explain in chapter 8, the police cannot conduct a search without a warrant—that is, without written permission from a judge. But schools are an exception. The 1998 Supreme Court case R. v. M. (M.R.) (1998 CanLII 770 [SCC]) dealt with the issue of student searches. Two junior high school students were called to the vice-principal’s office after another student reported that they were planning to sell drugs at a school dance. The vice-principal, who had made sure that a police officer was present, said he was going to search them. In the course of the search, one of the students was found to have a bag of marijuana hidden in one of his socks. The officer arrested him and then, in the company of the student, went on to inspect his locker, where no more drugs were found. The student sued, and the case went all the way to the Supreme Court. The student’s legal counsel argued that because section 8 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects people against “unreasonable search or seizure,” the student’s rights had been violated. But the court ruled that the search was actually not unreasonable. As the court saw it, the government has a duty to keep schools safe, and so someone who is on school property cannot reasonably expect to have the same degree of privacy there as elsewhere. The court also found that the way the search was conducted was in line with the rules for doing so.

However, in this and other cases, the courts have also ruled that schools should have good reason for limiting students’ privacy. If the school suspects that a student is hiding drugs or weapons, this qualifies as a good reason for a search. But if the school thinks that the student is hiding chewing gum, a toy, or some other harmless object that he or she is not supposed to bring to school, this may not be a good reason. Also, to search a student’s person, the school needs a stronger reason than it does to search a student’s locker or desk, and personal searches must be handled very carefully and respectfully. This is because your clothes—and your body—are private: they belong to you, while your locker belongs to the school and is just on loan to you during the school year.

LGBTQA Rights in School

In 2012, the Ontario legislature passed Bill 13, the “Accepting Schools Act.” This law amended the Education Act to require publicly funded schools to create a safe and supportive environment for gay, bisexual, and transgender students. If you are an LGBTQA student or a friend of such a student, your school must not discriminate against you, and this is true whether you attend a standard public school or a separate (Catholic) school. In practice, this law means, for instance, that your school cannot stop you from founding a “Gay-Straight Alliance” or similar club. It also means that the school should respect the name you go by to express your gender and your choice of pronoun (whether he, she, they, or something else). In addition, you have the right to go to a prom with a same-sex date and, if there is a school uniform, to use the one that reflects your chosen gender.

The courts have found that section 15 of the Charter of Rights protects you from discrimination on the basis of your sexual orientation. Various federal, provincial, and territorial human rights codes also require government agencies to respect the rights of gay and transgender people. Therefore, schools and boards of education are slowly changing their policies with regard to issues such as whether to designate gender-neutral washrooms or whether to allow transgender students to join either a male or a female sports team, as they prefer. Student privacy is another very important aspect of LGBTQA rights. For example, Alberta amended the School Act in 2017 to say that schools are not to let parents know that their child has joined a gay-straight alliance club. Unfortunately, a more conservative government repealed this provision in 2019, though section 35.1 of the new Education Act still allows students to form gay-straight alliances at their schools. The Vancouver School Board made “confidentiality”—respecting the privacy of gay and transgender students—part of its rules on LGBTQA students in 2014.

Shortly before the second edition went to print, the New Brunswick Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development revised Policy 713 to include the following rules for gender identity:

Self-identification

Section 6.3.1 and 6.3.2 will read as follows:

6.3.1 School personnel will consult with a transgender or non-binary student who is 16 and over to determine their preferred first name and pronoun(s). The preferred first name and pronoun(s) will be used consistently in ways that the student has requested.

6.3.2 Transgender or non-binary students under the age of 16 will require parental consent in order for their preferred first name to be officially used for recordkeeping purposes and daily management (EECD, school district, and school software applications, report cards, class lists, etc.). If it is not possible to obtain consent to talk to the parent, the student will be directed to the appropriate professional (i.e. school social worker, school psychologist) to work with them in the development of a plan to speak with their parents if and when they are ready to do so. If it is not in the best interest of the child or could cause harm to the student (physical or mental threat), the student will be directed to the appropriate school professional for support.

Not only are LGBTQA rights an area in which the law is still developing, but society can be slow to catch up with the law. So it’s wise to check your local school board’s policy on matters pertaining to sexual orientation and choice of gender.

Consequences for Breaking the Rules

As a general rule, teachers are allowed to discipline students within reason, and their discipline should be similar to that of a kind, firm, and judicious parent. Whatever methods they choose, though, corporal punishment is no longer allowed in school. Teachers may use physical force only for restraining students when they need to physically control them; they may not hit or hurt them as punishment. The Supreme Court of Canada decided this in Canadian Foundation for Children, Youth and the Law v. Canada (2004 SCC 4 [CanLII]), which we discussed in chapter 3. The vast majority of provinces and territories have additionally banned corporal punishment in their own laws about public schools.

For some offences, you can be suspended (temporarily forbidden to enter the school) or, for more serious offences, expelled (kept out for an indefinite period of time or even permanently). In Ontario, the reasons for which a principal must consider suspending you are found in section 306(1) of the Education Act:

1. Uttering a threat to inflict serious bodily harm on another person.
2. Possessing alcohol or illegal drugs or, unless the pupil is a medical cannabis user, cannabis.
3. Being under the influence of alcohol or, unless the pupil is a medical cannabis user, cannabis.
4. Swearing at a teacher or at another person in a position of authority.
5. Committing an act of vandalism that causes extensive damage to school property at the pupil’s school or to property located on the premises of the pupil’s school.
6. Bullying.
7. Any other activity that is an activity for which a principal may suspend a pupil under a policy of the board.

Even if you didn’t do one of these things during school hours or on school property (for example, if you bullied a classmate over the weekend), you may still be suspended if what you did could affect the overall atmosphere at the school.

According to section 306(4) of the Education Act, you may be suspended for one to twenty school days. During this period, you cannot attend classes, but, depending on the duration of the suspension, you will either be given a homework package or offered a program for suspended students. As section 308 specifies, the principal must let your teachers know about the suspension, and you must be given written notice of it—and, unless you are 18 or are 16 or 17 and have withdrawn from parental control, your parents must receive written notice as well.

Because a suspension normally goes on your school record⁸ and can work to your disadvantage later, you may wish to appeal a suspension to the district school board (or other such authority)—although, according to the rules laid out in section 309 of the act, unless you are 18 or are 16 or 17 and have withdrawn from parental control, your parents will have to make the appeal on your behalf (or anyone else allowed to appeal under board policy). Notice of the intention to appeal must be received by the board within ten school days from the beginning of the suspension, and the board must hear and decide the appeal within fifteen school days of receiving the notice. The hearing will be similar to a trial, in that both sides will have a chance to defend their position. Even if your parents made the appeal, you are allowed to be present at the hearing and make your own statement; it is also possible to have a lawyer represent you. If the board decides that the suspension was not imposed fairly, the suspension will end (if it hasn’t already) and will be erased from your school record.

For some quite serious offences, the principal must suspend you. According to section 310(1) of the Ontario Education Act, these offences are:

1. Possessing a weapon, including possessing a firearm.

2. Using a weapon to cause or to threaten bodily harm to another person.

3. Committing physical assault on another person that causes bodily harm requiring treatment by a medical practitioner.

4. Committing sexual assault.

5. Trafficking in weapons or in illegal drugs.

6. Committing robbery.

7. Giving alcohol or cannabis to a minor.

7.1. Bullying, if,

i. the pupil has previously been suspended for engaging in bullying, and

ii. the pupil’s continuing presence in the school creates an unacceptable risk to the safety of another person.

7.2. Any activity listed in subsection 306(1) that is motivated by bias, prejudice or hate based on race, national or ethnic origin, language, colour, religion, sex, age, mental or physical disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, or any other similar factor.

8. Any other activity that, under a policy of a board, is an activity for which a principal must suspend a pupil and, therefore in accordance with this Part, conduct an investigation to determine whether to recommend to the board that the pupil be expelled.

In the case of such offences, the written notice of the suspension must include information about the investigation that the principal will carry out before deciding whether to recommend expulsion. Section 311.1 contains rules about how this investigation will proceed. If the principal recommends the expulsion, the board will hold a hearing, again similar to a trial at which the voices of all sides are heard (see s. 311.3).

If the board decides to expel you, it will choose either to exclude you only from your school or to exclude you from all the schools in the board’s district. In the first case, the board will assign you to a new school within its district; in the second, it will assign you to a program for expelled students (Education Act, s. 311.5). You can apply to enrol at a school in another board’s district, but you might not be admitted unless you move to that district—and, in any case, the new school will learn about your expulsion when it gets your record, which could affect how the school treats you.

An expulsion is not necessarily permanent: the Education Act (s. 311.7) makes it possible to appeal an expulsion to a special tribunal, and you can ask to return to school if you successfully complete a program for expelled students. Still, you will lose a lot of time in this way, and it can seriously affect your education. All in all, then, it’s better not to get yourself expelled in the first place.

Bullying

Bullying is an issue that schools are now taking very seriously. In Ontario, for example, bullying is defined in detail in section 1(1) of the Education Act as any “aggressive and typically repeated” behaviour by a pupil that can cause harm, fear, or distress to someone else or create a negative school environment for that person. This behaviour can include not only physical violence or threats of violence but also any other kind of intimidation. Intimidation means anything that gives or seems to give the bully more power over the bullied person because of differences between them in size, strength, age, intelligence, peer group power, economic or social status, family circumstances, religion, race or ethnic origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, disability, or the need to receive special education. Bullying is not necessarily physical. It includes things that the bully says to or about the person being bullied or writes about them. Cyberbullying (also called online harassment) refers to using the Internet to engage in bullying behaviour; this includes repeatedly sending insulting or intimidating messages to someone via text messaging or email, as well as spreading negative or embarrassing information about someone via social networking sites and services such as Facebook or Twitter. Cyberbullying is an especially cowardly form of bullying, since it allows a bully to avoid having to actually confront another person.

In recent years, quite a few provinces have passed laws that define bullying and require schools to deal with it. In Ontario, the Education Act expects school boards to prevent bullying, to regularly educate teachers and other staff about preventing bullying and about how to foster a positive atmosphere at school, and to have programs that deal with bullies and help students who have been bullied. In Ontario schools, the week beginning on the third Sunday in each November is now “Bullying Awareness and Prevention Week.”

Many things that bullies do are not merely cruel but are in fact crimes and may be prosecuted as such. Such crimes include physically attacking a victim, threatening him or her, encouraging him or her to commit suicide, sending false or harassing messages or making similar phone calls, or threatening someone in order to get money from him or her. Bullying behaviour that causes the victim to fear for his or her own safety or for the safety of someone the victim knows constitutes “criminal harassment,” as defined in section 264 of the Criminal Code.

As the law recognizes, no one should have to live with bullying. If you experience it, you should immediately report it to your school. If the school is unhelpful, you and your parents should consider talking to a lawyer and, if the bullying includes possible criminal activity, involving the police. Under no circumstances should you blame yourself for the bullying or feel that you somehow deserve it. You don’t.

Disciplining the Teacher

As with students, teachers may not behave any way they want to at school. While doing their work, teachers must meet certain standards and should not be disrespectful or abusive toward students. Otherwise, there may be legal consequences. In Ontario, any member of the public—including a student or his or her parents—may file a complaint against a teacher with the Ontario College of Teachers (OCT), which regulates teachers in publicly funded schools. In order for the OCT to consider the complaint, it must be related to professional misconduct, incompetence, or incapacity on the part of the teacher, it must not be frivolous or made for an improper purpose (such as retaliation), and there shouldn’t be any other good reason not to investigate the complaint (Ontario College of Teachers Act, 1996, s. 26[2]). If there is a hearing and the complaint proves to be justified, the teacher will be subject to some sort of penalty, which, depending on how serious the offence was, may range from a reprimand to losing his or her licence to teach.

Filing a complaint is a serious matter. If a teacher behaves in a way that is thoroughly inappropriate and/or unprofessional (to say nothing of out-and-out illegal), then this behaviour should be brought to the attention of the authorities, especially if the behaviour could affect other students. But people who file complaints over relatively minor offences are sometimes seen as troublemakers, and doing so could result in bad relations with your school. So if you have a complaint about a teacher, it is generally best to talk with the principal of your school before going all the way up to the OCT, in hopes that the situation can be resolved in some other way.

Religion in School

In the United States, it has long been considered unacceptable to teach or promote religion in public schools—for example, by expecting students to recite the Lord’s Prayer. The First Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees the right to freedom of religion and establishes a principle known as the separation of church and state. So any government institution, including a school, must treat everyone the same, no matter what they believe or don’t believe, and should not impose any specific religion. In Canada, this rule is still not fully respected everywhere. This is mainly because, in colonial Canada, Protestant and Catholic schools had certain rights under provincial law, and, at Confederation, these rights were confirmed by section 93 of the 1867 Constitution Act. In 1982, section 29 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms reconfirmed these rights. So the continued existence of separate religious schools as part of the publicly funded school system is a constitutional right. Today, after some amendments, the Constitution protects separate Protestant or Catholic schools in Alberta, Ontario, and Saskatchewan, and the law also allows them in the three territories. The United Nations has criticized Canada for continuing to fund religious schools with tax money, but this system still exists.

Even in public schools that are not associated with a particular denomination, the law may still allow religious instruction or including prayer in school activities, although this has become less common. In the diverse and multicultural Canada of today, public schools tend to understand that students have different religions or no religion at all and that imposing religion could be considered unconstitutional. In Ontario, section 51 of the Education Act allows a student to receive whatever religious instruction the student’s parent wishes (or that the student wishes, if the student is an adult). Furthermore, clause (c) of section 264(1) still requires teachers to nurture in students, among other things, “respect for religion and the principles of Judaeo-Christian morality.” This clause is, however, unlikely to be enforced today.

In fact, in Ontario, the mandatory recitation of the Lord’s Prayer in public schools ceased after the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled in the 1988 case Zylberberg v. Sudbury Board of Education (Director) (1988 CanLII 189 [ONCA]) that making students recite the prayer violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.⁹ The following year, a similar case in British Columbia led that province’s Supreme Court to decide the same way as the Ontario court. As a result, the British Columbia School Act was changed to eliminate the required recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, which was replaced with a rule that all public schools must be run on “strictly secular and non-sectarian” (that is, non-religious) principles and that “the highest morality must be inculcated, but no religious dogma or creed is to be taught” (ss. 76[1] and 76[2]). In general, since public schools are run by the government, and the government must respect the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, all the remaining laws that allow religious exercises (except in separate schools) could one day be found unconstitutional.

In separate schools, students have traditionally received instruction in the faith of the religious group that supports the school. Depending on the province, the school may be able to require that students take part in prayers and religious services. In 2014, however, the Ontario Superior Court decided in Erazo v. Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board (2014 ONSC 2072 [CanLII]) that a boy who went to a Catholic school but was not Catholic himself didn’t have to participate in any of the school’s religious activities. So this requirement may also be on its way out.

Of course, if you want to pray at school, you always have the right to do so, provided you don’t do so in a way that disturbs the lesson or other students and teachers.

In short, the school system in Canada tries to keep you safe, to teach you to respect other people’s rights (and other people to respect yours), and to give you a reasonable number of choices. We think it’s ironic, though, that a system that is supposed to be teaching you skills you will need as an adult still tends to make it difficult for you to make these choices yourself, independently of your parents, even once you reach high school. We also find it strange that a multicultural country such as Canada, where people of any and all religions, including those who have no religion, are supposed to be equal, still has religious schools—but only Christian ones—that are paid for by public money. What sort of message does this deliver to students (and to adults)?