-
The education minister should immediately give school boards the funds they need to meet the requirements of the bill.
-
More training on teaching exceptional children should be provided to teachers and … should provide more such training in their education programs.
-
The education minister should provide leadership by accenting the successes and positive points of integration (Committee reports, 1989).
Continuing controversy over integration and intensive pressure from the province’s teachers’ union had prompted the minister of education in May 1989, to mandate this committee with the task of reviewing the integration process that has been under way in New Brunswick since the passage of Bill 85 in 1986. Union leaders had maintained that integration was putting New Brunswick’s already strained education system at risk of collapse. The president of the New Brunswick Teachers’ Association claimed that “integration is turning classrooms into zoos” and creating conditions in which “teachers can’t teach and students can’t learn” (Benteau, 1989). The union insisted that the “horror stories” of integration be made public and that the issue be included in their negotiation of a new collective agreement (Richardson, 1989). As a result, the committee’s strong support for the integration process came as a surprise to many and as a relief to advocates for students with disabilities.
While provincial legislation in Canada requires school boards to provide educational services to students with disabilities, how the service is delivered is generally left to the discretion of local school authorities. In Ontario, the passage of Bill 82 in 1980 raised parents’ hopes that integrated programs would be easier to achieve, but that has not been the result. Both British Columbia and Alberta have recently revised their legislation governing schools, but the right of a student with disabilities to placement in a regular class with his or her nondisabled peers is not assured.
