In this issue:
Human rights
The summer/fall 2020 Our Schools/ Our Selves digs into the underlying issues of equity and access that have been revealed and exacerbated by the COVID-19-related shutdown and subsequent move to online and remote learning; a cross-country scan provides an overview of the various funding mechanisms currently in place for public education in each province and territory to illustrate the link between funding, policy and priorities.
What have post-pandemic school reopening policies revealed about provincial priorities, and how have public education advocates, parents, students and communities responded? Can we take this moment in time to effectively advocate for a vision of public education that is more responsive to student needs, more reflective of the diverse communities our schools must serve, and more aware of the role schools play as places of learning and places of work, particularly in the context of a global pandemic and a growing mental health crisis?
Maria Rose Sikyea is a young Dené artist living in Yukon with her adorable three-year-old. When I spoke to her in November, she was expecting a second child, whom she hoped would be delivered with the assistance of a midwife. But like many others in her situation, Sikyea faced a considerable roadblock: Yukon is the only Canadian jurisdiction that does not offer access to government-provided and funded midwifery.
"If we learn anything from COVID-19," write Lindsay McLaren and Trish Hennessy in their cover feature for this issue, "it should be that we need to build and foster a more comprehensive version of public health that acts on what we know about the social determinants of well-being." Economy and health are not separate things, they argue, and public health policy should not be limited to matters of primary care.
As part of Canada’s Feminist Foreign Policy White Paper consultation, the federal government asked civil society organizations and individuals how Canada can use the diplomatic tools at its disposal, in multilateral and bilateral forums, “to reinforce efforts to uphold and advance human rights, gender equality and inclusion, while helping to reform the current international rules-based order and shape the system as it evolves to Canada’s advantage.”
In this issue:
Photo by Francis Mariani (Flickr Creative Commons)
Donald Trump makes people sick, himself and his entourage included. Given the U.S. president's shameful, almost criminally negligent record on COVID-19, it will be surprising if he is re-elected on November 3. A sizeable expat community aside, most Canadians will not have a say in that race but its outcome will be felt globally.