Party Politics Redux

So boob wheels. Good way to start an election campaign. Alright, now that the semi-requisite snickering has been presented right from the start, let’s get on with it.

I wrote a critique of the Wildrose platform in 2010, which I reposted here last year. It was read by quite a few people, however, either no wildrose supporters read it, or they flippantly disregarded it without providing feedback or an angry diatribe. looks, let’s be honest, anyone of any political stripe or leaning or armchair expert can go on a political rant, but for whatever reason, supporters of right wing parties just seem to able to get their voices to get that little bit louder causing everyone else to roll their eyes.

Instead of reposting my previous critique, I suppose I should go through the new, fancy and flashy policy statement the wildrose has begun to dangle in front of voters. However, instead of tackling it all at once, let’s break it up and ask some questions about one or two policy sections at a time.

firstly, here is the Constitution of the Wildrose Alliance Party, which is now no longer visible on their website. It is important to remember that this document is the very basis of the party’s policies and direction. I would think that a document as important as this would be easily found on their website, but apparently I’m wrong. Allow me to posit an idea as to why: It’s not written simply enough. Voters, especially single issue voters and those voters who do not see fit to actually read the founding documents of parties they vote for, like to see large, all encompassing ideas presented to them in easy to read, large letters. as such, all parties take advantage of this.

Herein lies a problem. Voters assume that establishing and implementing policy is easy. It’s not. Again, all parties put forward the idea that with broad, sweeping strokes, they can magically change things overnight. Even if they don’t explicitly say this, voters expect this to be the case. Case in point, the Federal gun registry. Tory supporters constantly gripe about why it’s taking so long to get rid of. It’s a federal program that’s been in operation since 1995. There’s pressure from some provinces to keep it. It will cost people their jobs. You can’t just swipe a pen over a document and end that, yet this is the assumption and expectation too many voters have, whether on the federal or provincial scale.

Thus we get documents like this: the new Wildrose policy document that takes the founding principles of the party and changes them into something easily palatable by supporters. It, like these types of documents from all parties, is couched in simple terms and written in a way so that you could make most everybody agree with it if you don’t let them know which party it originated from.

Now, let’s get in to the meat and potatoes of it. Today, let’s go over….

Education:

Empower individual public, Catholic and public charter schools by
implementing a funding model that sends per-student operational and
maintenance funding directly to the school each student attends while
accounting for the fixed costs of schools in smaller rural communities.

No mention of where this funding will come from, how much the per-student funding will be, or whether or not the fixed costs of rural schools will be adjusted to remain on par with the funding provided to schools in urban areas.

Transfer decision-making authority concerning the building of new schools
away from the provincial government and place it squarely in the hands of
locally elected school boards

Ask Red Deer city council how this went when they tried to have a new French Immersion school built.

Establish multiple pilot projects across the province where open-enrollment
and tuition-free public, Catholic and public charter schools are permitted to
opt into a competency-based learning and assessment education model.
Students who learn at an accelerated
pace under this system will also be able to obtain college and university
level course credit while still in high school.

These programs will need to be subsidized since the schools will not be taking in tuition money. Where do the subsidies come from? Are these pilot schools subject to the same amount of per-student funding as mentioned above? If these schools are open-enrollment and tuition free, how will you prevent overcrowding? If these pilot schools are faced with too many potential students, who determines who will be allowed in or not? If these schools are a success, how do you respond to increasing demand by parents across the province to either reduce or eliminate tuition fees and restrictive enrollment? This would require huge subsidies, where would that money come from?

On the topic of college/university credits while in high school, what will be done about the lost tuition to post-secondary institutions from students receiving these credits away from these institutions? Has there been any discussion of what types of transfer agreements would be necessary to ensure a smooth transition from high school to a university where you already have courses completed? What about high school students wishing to pursue a trade? There is no mention of any type of credit or work experience that would be transferred to a trade program. This is Alberta, I would think that incentives to students to move into trade programs would feature highly in an education statement.

Protect a parent’s right to choose what school their child attends (public,
Catholic, public charter, private or homeschooling) and continue the
current Alberta Education practice of permitting a fixed percentage of
regular per pupil funding to directly follow a student to a private school of
the parent’s choice if desired.

I didn’t realize that this choice was threatened. My sister and I went to the school my parents chose for us. My boss’s child is going to the school she chose for her. With regard to the funding following a student to a private school, I would assume that if you can afford to send your child to a private school, this funding wouldn’t actually make much of a difference to the student or parents. It would essentially be extra funding the school receives. If a student is enrolled in a private, tuition based school, why not reduce this per-student funding and redirect it to smaller school, rural schools, or schools where higher rates of enrollment are causing pressure on available resources?

Mandate the public reporting of each school’s graduation rate and overall
subject-by-subject assessment results so parents have the information they
need to make informed decisions regarding their child’s education.

I honestly don’t see much of a benefit here. In fact, I can see this causing potential problems if large numbers of parents aren’t agreeable with the results of particular schools and remove their children from them and place them in another. This reduces potential funding to the first schools, which could be used to improve programs and raise graduation or course completion rates. It would cause a potential influx of students into other schools, reducing available resources and putting significant strain on already large classroom sizes.

Work with teachers and other educational professionals to replace the
outdated and inadequate Provincial Achievement Tests (PAT) with a new
standardized assessment model that evaluates a student’s actual
improvement and comprehension of subject matter and more effectively
identifies where further learning is required. It is also important to ensure
teachers are provided with the professional development training
necessary to implement such a model.

I understand the standardized assessment model, but what form will it take? How will it be developed? What aspects of the education curriculum will it involve? How do you objectively assess understanding of material? How long will it take to replace the PAT? How much money will it cost to replace the PAT with standardized assessments and train educators to implement this new model? Will this money come from the per-student funding each school receive, or elsewhere? How will these standardized assessments be implemented in the pilot project schools with open-enrollment and student based progression?

Advanced Education:

Establish a student loan forgiveness program that gradually forgives
student loans incurred by graduates who choose to remain in Alberta to
practice a trade or profession of high need over an extended period of
time.

Forgiveness programs like this exist for high demand professions, especially for individuals who work in high demand areas.

Review the Alberta student loan application process to ensure loan
amounts meet the basic living needs of students and eliminate parental
income as a factor in determining final approved loan amounts.

This isn’t a particularly new idea, and has been touted by many parties as a solution to providing student loans. However, a key word here is ‘review’. Review is one of those political terms that means a topic will be examined but likely not acted on. I’m sure that once a ‘review’ of this idea is examined, the amount of additional funds needed to provide students with loans would be too large for a party who is not in favour of further taxation.

Invest in Internet-based learning and other technologies for the purpose of
opening up thousands of additional post-secondary spaces without having
to spend billions of taxpayer dollars unnecessarily on increasingly outdated
teaching methodologies and infrastructure.

Anyone who’s ever taken an online course or program knows that it is in no way equal to courses or programs where you are physically present. Internet based courses allow educators from outside of Alberta to develop and provide course material. Will tuition for online courses be reduced? Will course resources be subsidized if you choose to take a course at home?

Rather than setting arbitrary limits on
courses of study, Alberta universities, colleges and technical schools should
be competing for students by offering the programs and courses students
most want to enroll in.

Wouldn’t it make more sense to expand the availability of these programs, especially if they’re high demand? At no point in this document is there mention of increasing student capacity at post-secondary institutions. If your ultimate goal is to offer more spaces for high demand programs, why promote competition to attract students? Competition and program expansion are two very different concepts.

At no point in this new policy document is there mention of several key party principles that are plainly written in the party constitution.

Let’s examine some of those:

5. A Wildrose Government will institute methods to hold educators accountable for performance

Both of my parents were teachers. Parents of many of my friends growing up were teacher. Many of my friends went in to education in university, only a few of them stuck with it. Why? Because the teacher is always at fault. No consideration is ever given to the student being a problem, the parent being a problem, or education requirements being the problem. No, it’s always the teacher’s fault. Your kid got in to a fight at recess? Teacher’s fault. Your kid didn’t do his homework and failed their exam? Teacher’s fault. Your child is consistently disruptive in class? Teacher’s fault. A common misconception is that teacher’s are essentially babysitters. They’re not, and if you think they are, then you have some very hard thinking to do. Educators are there to provide your children with the methods to learn, not to parent them. Of course, no party would ever put in writing that an education policy would be to hold parents accountable for their child’s problems with learning. that would be political suicide.

6. A Wildrose Government will give Alberta students priority for admission and funding at Alberta post-secondary institutions.

As I’ve said to many people, I was born in Alberta but did not go to university in Alberta. There were programs available in other provinces and institutions that were better and held my interest more. I would think that if a party is intent on bringing research funding and bright minds into the province to contribute to the provincial economy and education, that restrictive policies such as this would be done away with. Their new policy document says that they will increase spaces for in-demand degrees and programs, yet this founding party principle essentially denies many of these spaces to students from other provinces. This will drive research funding away from the province. This will drive students looking to enroll in Alberta institutions elsewhere.

i) We believe in universal public access to education.

This is actually contradicted in their own position on education where they state “1. A Wildrose Government will give priority for admission and funding to Alberta students to post-secondary institutions.” These two words are not mutually cooperative. ‘Priority’ and ‘universal’ do NOT mean the same thing. This policy makes absolutely no sense and the list of policy statements they have regarding education could be downright damaging. The options students have for post-secondary education are not limited to a single province, so why they choose to limit entry from out of province students when Albertans are leaving to take their education elsewhere might actually cause a drop in enrollment in Alberta’s educational institutions.

At no point is there discussion of education for seniors, or what kind of incentives would be made available to people seeking further education to either change careers or improve their own positions in already established careers.  Is on the job training not counted as education? Will there be any government incentives for this?

The Wildrose explicitly states in their constitution that they are in favour of the lowest possible taxation. Looking at their education policies, I don’t see where reductions in taxes would allow them to provide tuition free schools, open-enrollment, or increase spaces in high-demand post-secondary fields. The subsidies needed to provide programs or spaces such as these are not low-cost, especially if they result in higher demand from educators, parents and students.

Next time, let’s look at economic and environmental policies.