The Legault government is looking to make changes to home schooling in the province — and parents who home school their kids say they aren't happy.
Recently, Education Minister Jean-François Roberge introduced the new rules, which would essentially ensure students are taught the same subjects as everyone else, in the same year as their in-school counterparts. At the end of the year, they would have to take standard provincial exams in those subjects.
The idea, Roberge said at the time, would be to give every youngster in Quebec the "same opportunities to succeed."
Noémi Berlus, the director of the Quebec Association of Home Schooling, who also home schools her two children, told CJAD 800's Elias Makos the changes the minister is proposing essentially removes the reason why homeschooling is a preferred option in the first place.
"It's not just just a curriculum, they want us to teach the Quebec curriculum exactly as it's taught in school," Berlus says. "And the reason we took our children out of school...there's 40 per cent of families in our association have a child that has a learning difficulty or some other kind of challenge. So, those people will have the stress of having to prep a child that wouldn't have passed an exam in school to ddo an exam in a completely hostile environment."
Berlus says the minister hasn't checked in with her group for their input before making the changes to home schooling.
Two years ago, the former Liberal government issued a set of rules to that effect in response to reports of illegal Hasidic Jewish schools. Those rules haven't been implemented, though Berlus says the religious communities affected by the rules have "stepped up" and complied with the Quebec curriculum.
About 5,300 children are currently registered with the government as being home schooled, though Berlus suggests there are many more out there who aren't registered.