Section 5: School attendance
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Section 5.1 Education in the minority language outside Quebec
Section 5.1.1 Language of school attended at elementary and secondary level
Section 5.1.2 Language of school attended at pre-kindergarten and kindergarten level
Section 5.1.3 Reasons for choosing the school attended
Section 5.1.4 Characteristics of parents
Section 5.2 Education in the minority language in Quebec
Section 5.2.1 Language of school attended at elementary or secondary level
Section 5.2.2 Language of school attended at the pre-kindergarten and kindergarten level
Section 5.2.3 Characteristics of parents
Notes
The Survey on the Vitality of Official Language Minorities (SVOLM) is an important source of information for getting a better grasp of the situation of official language minorities. And of all the data collected, those on minority school attendance are probably some of the most important.
Until now, there were administrative data on enrolment in minority schools and immersion programs, but there was almost nothing on the characteristics of the students, other than age and sex. Thus it was not possible to determine the proportion of children of rights holder parents1 who attended these schools or programs.
With the statistics collected by the SVOLM, it is possible for the first time to determine the proportion of young people who have at least one parent belonging to the official language minority and who attend minority schools. More specifically, the survey makes it possible to estimate the proportion of rights holder parents whose children are registered in minority schools. Also, both in Quebec and outside that province, the data collected can be used to estimate the proportion of young people with one parent belonging to the minority who attend an immersion program. Outside Quebec, immersion is done in the minority language, while in Quebec; it is instead done in the majority language. The SVOLM includes information on the main reasons explaining parents' choices regarding their children's language of instruction.
As already noted in a previous section, the children in the survey were selected according to the linguistic characteristics of their parents, namely those parents with the minority language as their mother tongue and allophone parents with the minority language as their first official language spoken (FOLS), based on the relative weight of these groups within the overall population of the region surveyed. Hence, the children themselves did not necessarily belong to the official language minority.
Outside Quebec, since the proportion of allophone parents with French as their FOLS is fairly low, the vast majority of the selected children had a parent whose mother tongue was French. Consequently, a very large proportion of children (92%) had a rights holder parent, whose mother tongue is the main criterion used in section 23 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to designate the population that can claim the right to instruction in the minority language.
In Quebec, the situation is different. Since the proportion of allophone parents with English as their FOLS is relatively high, the proportion of selected children with one "rights holder" parent is lower. Also, the conditions of eligibility for schooling in the minority language are different in Quebec since, due to Section 59 of the Constitution Act, 1982, the mother tongue criterion does not apply. Due to the numerous criteria used to define the status of rights holder parents in Quebec, the current section does not, however, present any results that focus specifically on children of rights holder parents for this province.
Section 5.1 Education in the minority language outside Quebec
There were 258,030 children under 18 years of age with at least one French-speaking parent who were registered in a school at the time of the survey. The discussion in this subsection is confined to children registered in an elementary or secondary school (225,800) or a pre-kindergarten or kindergarten (30,335)2.
Section 5.1.1 Language of school attended at elementary and secondary level
School serves as an agent of linguistic and cultural reproduction. Schooling in the minority language is closely related to language retention, the level of literacy in that language and hence the level of language proficiency acquired. It is therefore not surprising that schools are a key social domain for Francophones outside Quebec. For more than a century, their right to have and manage French-language schools and educate their children in French have all been major issues both in legal and constitutional terms and in cultural terms.
According to the survey data, 49% of children with at least one French-speaking parent attend a French-language elementary or secondary school. Another 15% of children are exposed to instruction in French within a French immersion program.
An analysis of attendance of French-language schools by education level shows that the proportion of children who are registered in French-language schools at the elementary level (53%) is higher than the proportion attending French-language secondary schools (44%). In addition, the proportion of young people registered in a French immersion program was almost the same at the elementary level (15%) as at the secondary level (14%).
| Language of schooling | Schooling level | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elementary | Secondary | Total | ||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
| Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 | ||||||
| French | 75,790 | 53 | 35,840 | 44 | 111,630 | 49 |
| English | 66,520 | 46 | 44,790 | 54 | 111,310 | 49 |
| Immersion | 21,750 | 15 | 11,590 | 14 | 33,340 | 15 |
| Regular | 44,780 | 31 | 33,200 | 40 | 77,970 | 35 |
| Total1 | 143,570 | 100 | 82,230 | 100 | 225,800 | 100 |
Among children with a least one rights holder parent, the proportion attending a French-language school is similar, although slightly higher at 52%. Also, among children of Rights Holder parents registered in primary school, 56% attend French school whereas this proportion is 47% among those who are registered in secondary school. The proportion of children with an rights holder parent who are registered in a French immersion program is also 15% (see tables 5.2a and 5.2b).
| Language of schooling | Children of rights holder parents | Children of non rights holder parents | Total of children with at least one French-speaking parent | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
E use with caution Note: The number of children of rights holder parents is based on the biological parents' information. Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||
| French | 74,330 | 56 | 1,459E | 15E | 75,788 | 53 |
| English | 58,210 | 44 | 8,311 | 84 | 66,524 | 46 |
| Immersion | 19,800 | 15 | 1,948E | 20E | 21,746 | 15 |
| Regular | 38,410 | 29 | 6,363 | 64 | 44,778 | 31 |
| Total1 | 133,700 | 100 | 9,872 | 100 | 143,568 | 100 |
| Language of schooling | Children of rights holder parents | Children of non rights holder parents | Total of children with at least one French-speaking parent | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
E use with caution F too unreliable to be published x suppressed to meet the confidentiality requirements of the Statistics Act Note: The number of children of rights holder parents is based on the biological parents' information. Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||
| French | 35,300 | 47 | x | x | 35,840 | 44 |
| English | 38,630 | 51 | 6,160E | 92E | 44,785 | 55 |
| Immersion | 10,880 | 14 | 710E | F | 11,589 | 14 |
| Regular | 27,750 | 37 | 5,440E | 81 | 33,196 | 40 |
| Total1 | 75,520 | 100 | 6,710E | 100E | 82,231 | 100 |
In this regard, it should be noted that the survey yields an estimate of the number of children with one French-speaking parent who had previously been registered in an immersion program but who were no longer registered in one at the time of the survey. Ten percent of school-age children had previously been registered in this type of program. And according to the results obtained, it appears that most children who leave immersion programs go into regular instructional programs in English. Thus, 21% of such children went into an instructional program in French, compared to 73% who opted instead for an instructional program in English3.
Section 5.1.2 Language of school attended at pre-kindergarten and kindergarten level
Among the youngest children, 53% were registered in French-language schools, 44% in pre-kindergarten and 59% in kindergarten. Attendance of minority schools at the kindergarten level seems fairly stable over time. Thus, when young people in other age cohorts are compared with respect to previous attendance of French-language kindergartens, it emerges that among those currently registered at the elementary level, 57% had attended a French-language kindergarten. In the case of those currently registered at the secondary level, the corresponding proportion was 53%.
| Language of schooling | Schooling level | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pre-kindergarten | Kidergarten | Total | ||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
| Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 | ||||||
| French | 4,700 | 44 | 11,480 | 59 | 16,180 | 53 |
| English | 5,960 | 55 | 7,800 | 40 | 13,760 | 45 |
| Total1 | 10,800 | 100 | 19,540 | 100 | 30,340 | 100 |
The language of the school at this stage is especially important, since it is often an indicator of the language in which schooling will take place at the elementary level. Among the 143,570 children who currently attend an elementary school, 136,240 had previously attended a kindergarten. Among the latter, those who previously attended a French-language kindergarten, 87% currently attend a French-language elementary school compared to 12% who go to an English-language elementary school. Also, among children who previously attended an English-language kindergarten, 93% attended an English-language elementary school at the time of the survey.
Finally, of all children who currently attend an elementary school and who previously attended a kindergarten, 77,770 previously attended a French-language kindergarten school compared to 71,910 who currently attend a French-language elementary school, a decrease of almost 8% in numbers (see table 5.4).
| Language of present elementary school | Language of kindergarten attended in the past | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| French | English | Total1 | ||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
||||||
| French | 67,940 | 87 | 3,610 | 7 | 71,910 | 53 |
| English | 9,520 | 12 | 51,600 | 93 | 63,090 | 46 |
| Total2 | 77,770 | 100 | 55,750 | 100 | 136,240 | 100 |
Section 5.1.3 Reasons for choosing the school attended
In the Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities (SVOLM), questions were asked regarding the reasons for choosing the language of the elementary or secondary school that the child attended. For children attending a French-language school, the main reason given by parents was that French was their mother tongue or their main language. This reason was cited by the parents of 47% of children. The other two reasons cited by parents were that French was the child's mother tongue (28%) and that the child was registered there to learn French (25%). As for children registered in an immersion program, the reasons most often cited by the parents are related to the knowledge of both official languages.
In the case of children attending a majority school, the parents were asked whether they would have preferred their child to be registered instead in a French-language school. Also, the parents of 35% of the children registered in such a program stated that they would have preferred their child to be registered in a minority school. Among the reasons why such children were instead registered in an immersion program were the proximity of the current school, the lack of availability of a minority school and the quality of the program or school.
Of those not stating such a preference, that is they would not have preferred their child to be registered in a minority school, 88% nevertheless said that they considered it "very important" or "important" for their children to be able to speak French.
In the case of children registered in a regular program in English, the reasons most often cited by the parent are, in descending order, the proximity of the school (27%), because English is the mother tongue or language best known by the child (18%) or parent (17%) and the quality of the school or program (17%). However, the parents of 42% of the children registered in a regular program in an English school stated that they would have preferred their child to attend a French school. Finally, 59% of children who would not have preferred this nevertheless considered it "very important" or "important" for their children to be able to speak French.
Section 5.1.4 Characteristics of parents
The information contained in the survey allows us to profile the characteristics of parents whose children are registered in minority schools. Among the characteristics of interest are, if the parent is living in a couple relationship, the mother tongue of his/her spouse or partner, the language in which the parent was educated at the elementary and secondary level, and the parent's main language.
As previously noted, outside Quebec, 256,000 children with at least one French-speaking parent are registered in schools from the pre-kindergarten level to the secondary level.
Obviously, the spouse's mother tongue is an important characteristic to consider, given how widespread exogamy is in French-speaking minority communities. It is therefore important to examine, for all children living in the different types of families, the proportion of those who are registered in minority schools.
As Table 5.5 shows, outside Quebec, 29% of children whose parent's mother tongue4 is French live in French endogamous families (63,000 children), while 47% live in French-English exogamous families (almost 102,000 children).
Of the 63,000 children whose Francophone5 parent has a spouse with the same mother tongue, 88% are registered in a French school. Conversely, when the spouse of the Francophone parent is an Anglophone, a smaller proportion of these children go to French schools (34%) than to English schools (65%). Of the latter, 18% attend a French immersion program in an English school.
Furthermore, when examining the profile of students registered in a French-language school and for whom at least one parent is French-speaking, we observe that just over half (52%) are from French-speaking endogamous families, and one-third are from French-English exogamous families. Of those registered in an English-language school, 62% live in French-English exogamous families. Also, just over one-quarter of these young people were registered in an immersion program at the time of the survey.
However, all interpretation of the role of exogamy in the choice of the language of the school must take into account the fact that it is not always the exogamous condition per se that favors English to the detriment of French.
Indeed, results from the survey show that adults with a French mother tongue aged 25 to 44 (that is those likely to have young children of school age), who form an English-French exogamous couple and who declared speaking English most often at home, are proportionally very few to have started using English when they first formed an exogamous couple. In fact, 70% of these adults declared having begun to speak English most often at home before the age of 20 and 48% before the age of 13, that is before entering high school. Thus, this result seems to indicate that it is rather the fact of living in a context where English predominates as well as the fact of adopting this language as the main language which is conducive to the choice of an anglophone spouse or partner, than the reverse.
| Language of schooling | Type of family | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Endogamous French-English | Exogamous French-English | Exogamous French-Other | Others | Total1 | ||||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
E: use with caution |
||||||||||
| French | 55,240 | 88 | 34,700 | 34 | 5,870 | 37 | 10,150 | 30 | 105,960 | 49 |
| English | 7,150 | 11 | 65,840 | 65 | 9,590 | 60 | 23,500 | 69 | 106,070 | 49 |
| Immersion | 2,100 | 3 | 17,840 | 18 | 2,120E | 13E | 5,610E | 16E | 27,670 | 13 |
| Regular | 5,040 | 8 | 48,000 | 47 | 7,460 | 47 | 17,890 | 52 | 78,400 | 36 |
| Total2 | 63,130 | 100 | 101,680 | 100 | 15,880 | 100 | 34,260 | 100 | 214,950 | 100 |
The language in which the French-speaking parent was educated also seems to play some role in the choice of the school attended by their children (see table 5.6). Thus, of the 163,270 children whose parents were educated in French at the elementary and secondary levels, two-thirds attended French school at the time of the survey. Of the 55,370 children whose French-speaking parent attended neither primary nor secondary school in French, 83% attended an English school at the time of the survey.
Furthermore, the same table also shows that of the 127,800 children who attend a French-language school, approximately 107,570 (86%) have a French-speaking parent who was educated in that language at both the elementary and secondary levels.
| Language of schooling | Parent's level of schooling in French | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elementary only | Secondary only | Elementary and secondary | Neither elementary nor secondary | Total1 | ||||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||||||
| French | 10,500 | 31 | 1,130E | 32E | 107,570 | 66 | 8,610 | 16 | 127,810 | 50 |
| English | 22,910 | 67 | 2,360E | 68 | 53,850 | 33 | 45,950 | 83 | 125,070 | 49 |
| Immersion | 6,110 | 18 | 760E | 22E | 16,140 | 10 | 10,320 | 19 | 33,340 | 13 |
| Regular | 16,800 | 49 | 1,590E | 46 | 37,710 | 23 | 35,620 | 64 | 91,730 | 36 |
| Total2 | 34,010 | 100 | 3,490 | 100 | 163,270 | 100 | 55,370 | 100 | 256,130 | 100 |
The main language of the French-speaking parent plays a role in determining children's language of schooling. However, data presented in table 5.7 show that not all children whose parent has French as a main language (105,500) attend a French school; instead, the proportion is 80%. By comparison, among children whose French-speaking parent reports being equally at ease in English and French (45,200 children), only half are registered in minority schools. Finally, of the 105,400 children whose French-speaking parent reports being more at ease in English than in French, only 21% attend French school and another 18% attend a French immersion program in an English school.
| Language of schooling | Main language of the parent | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| French | English | French and English | Total | |||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
| Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 | ||||||||
| French | 84,280 | 80 | 22,240 | 21 | 21,290 | 47 | 127,810 | 50 |
| English | 20,390 | 19 | 81,350 | 77 | 23,330 | 52 | 125,070 | 49 |
| Immersion | 7,540 | 7 | 18,930 | 18 | 6,870 | 15 | 33,340 | 13 |
| Regular | 12,850 | 12 | 62,420 | 59 | 16,460 | 36 | 91,730 | 36 |
| Total1 | 105,510 | 100 | 105,380 | 100 | 45,250 | 100 | 256,130 | 100 |
Section 5.2 Education in the minority language in Quebec
In Quebec, the language of education of children of English-speaking parents is not always a matter of choice for the parents. In the case of children whose parents are Canadian citizens who had their elementary schooling in English in Canada, this choice exists. For those whose parents do not meet these criteria, the children must generally attend French schools under the criteria laid down in Quebec language legislation.
The number of children under 18 years of age with at least one English-speaking parent who were registered in a school at the time of the survey totalled 212,840.
This subsection focuses only on those who were registered in a pre-kindergarten or kindergarten (20,510 children) or in an elementary or secondary school (178,890 children).
Section 5.2.1 Language of school attended at elementary or secondary level
In Quebec, nearly half of children (49%) with at least one English-speaking parent are registered in an English-language elementary or secondary school. Of all children attending an English school, half are in a French immersion program. On this note, children whose parent's mother tongue is English are less likely (46%) to attend an immersion program than those whose parent's mother tongue is a language other than French or English (57%).
Information pertaining to the of attendance of English-language schools by education level shows (table 5.8) that the proportion of children registered in such schools at the elementary level (44%) is lower than the proportion registered at the secondary level (55%).
Also, among those attending English schools, the proportion who participate in a French immersion program is much higher at the elementary level (66%) than at the secondary level (35%).
| Language of schooling | Schooling level | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elementary | Secondary | Total | ||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
E use with caution Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||
| French | 50,450 | 52 | 35,580 | 44 | 86,030 | 48 |
| English | 42,640 | 44 | 44,590 | 55 | 87,230 | 49 |
| Immersion | 28,020 | 29 | 15,820 | 19 | 43,840 | 25 |
| Regular | 14,620 | 15 | 28,770 | 35 | 43,380 | 24 |
| Other | 3,890 | 4 | 1,550E | 2E | 5,440 | 3 |
| Total | 97,170 | 100 | 81,720 | 100 | 178,890 | 100 |
As regards the 86,000 young people registered in French-language schools (48%), one-third of them have parents who would have preferred to register them in a minority school. The reason most often cited for why their children are not registered in an English-language school is related to legal or monetary considerations6. This reason was cited by parents of 69% of these children.
However, while this situation is not what they would have chosen, the parents of 91% of these children nevertheless stated that they considered it "very important" or "important" for their children to be able to conduct a conversation in French.
In the case of the 66% of children registered in a French school whose parent would not have preferred to have registered them in an English school, many of the parents said they had registered them in a French school in order for them to learn that language. Legal or monetary considerations were also cited by the parents of 20% of these children.
Section 5.2.2 Language of school attended at the pre-kindergarten and kindergarten level
Attendance of English-language pre-kindergarten and kindergarten for children with at least one English-speaking parent is lower than attendance of such schools at the elementary and secondary levels. One-third of such children at this lower educational level attended English-language schools, while more than half (56%) were registered in French-language schools7. Also, the proportion of young people who are currently attending English kindergarten (34%) is lower than it was among young people currently at the elementary level at the time they were attending kindergarten (46%).
| Language of schooling | Schooling level | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pre-kindergarten | Kindergarten | Total | ||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
E: use with caution Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||
| French | 3,300E | 51 | 8,150 | 58 | 11,460 | 56 |
| English - total | 1,960E | 30E | 4,820E | 34 | 6,780 | 33 |
| Other | 1,170E | 18E | 1,100E | 8E | 2,270E | 11E |
| Total | 6,440 | 100 | 14,070 | 100 | 20,510 | 100 |
The choice of the kindergarten that English-speaking parents register their children in will have an effect on the language of the elementary school. As Table 5.10 shows, of the 41,110 children who had previously attended an English-language kindergarten, 36,520 (89%) currently attend an English-language school at the elementary level.
| Language of schooling | Language of kindergarten attended in the past | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| French | English | Other | Total | |||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
E use with caution x suppressed to meet the confidentiality requirements of the Statistics Act Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||||
| French | 40,080 | 92 | 2,950E | 7E | 2,030E | 57 | 45,060 | 51 |
| English | 3,050 | 7 | 36,520 | 89 | x | x | 39,900 | 45 |
| Other | x | x | 1,640E | 4E | 1,230E | 34E | 3,390E | 4E |
| Total | 43,740 | 100 | 41,110 | 100 | 3,590E | 100 | 88,540 | 100 |
Section 5.2.3 Characteristics of parents
Similarly to outside Quebec, our understanding of the choice of a school in Quebec is enhanced by an analysis of certain characteristics of the parents of young people registered in minority schools there, such as their language of schooling, the mother tongue of their spouse, where applicable, and their main language.
In Quebec, 199,400 children with at least one English-speaking parent were registered in schools from the pre-kindergarten level to the secondary level. The number of young people attending a French school (97,500) was slightly larger than the number attending an English school (94,000).
Information on the language in which the English-speaking parent was schooled also sheds light on the influence of that factor on parents' decision to register their child in a minority school.
As shown in table 5.11, of the 112,690 children with one parent who was schooled in English at both the elementary and secondary levels, two-thirds are registered in an English-language school, regardless of whether the parent's mother tongue is English or another language. Conversely, when the parent did neither his/her primary studies nor his/her secondary studies in English (which is the case for 65,250 children), 80% of the children attend French school.
| Language of schooling | Parent's level of schooling in English | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Secondary only | Elementary and secondary | Neither elementary nor secondary | Total | |||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
|
E use with caution Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||||
| French | 8,100 | 56 | 33,660 | 30 | 51,900 | 80 | 97,490 | 49 |
| English | 5,600 | 38 | 74,540 | 66 | 11,290 | 17 | 94,000 | 47 |
| Immersion | 3,060E | 21E | 34,250 | 30 | 5,790 | 9 | 43,850 | 22 |
| Regular | 2,540E | 17E | 40,290 | 36 | 5,500 | 8 | 50,160 | 25 |
| Total | 14,560 | 100 | 112,690 | 100 | 65,160 | 100 | 199,400 | 100 |
Furthermore, when we examine the profile of the youth attending English schools, results from the survey show that 79% of those registered in an English school have a parent who was schooled in that language at both the elementary and secondary levels. That proportion rises to 88% for children whose English-speaking parent also has English as his or her mother tongue.
The mother tongue of the spouse of the English-speaking parent, can also influence the choice of the school in which the child will be registered. As Table 5.12 shows, in Quebec, less than half of the 81,000 children whose English-speaking parent has English as his/her mother tongue live in English endogamous families (40%). Nearly half of them live in English-French exogamous families and others live in English-other-language exogamous families.
When we examine the information on the spouse or partner's mother tongue and on the language of the school attended by the child, one sees that, of the 32,400 children whose Anglophone parent has an Anglophone spouse or partner, 78% are registered in English schools. Conversely, when the spouse or partner of the Anglophone parent is a Francophone, a smaller proportion are registered in English schools (37%), while the majority are registered in French schools (61%).
| Language of schooling | Type of family | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Endogamous English-English | Exogamous English-French | Exogamous English-Other | Total1 | |||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
E use with caution |
||||||||
| French | 4,950 | 15 | 24,740 | 61 | 2,600E | 32E | 32,290 | 40 |
| English | 25,280 | 78 | 15,090 | 37 | 5,340 | 67 | 45,710 | 56 |
| Immersion | 12,610 | 39 | 5,430 | 13 | 3,300E | 41 | 21,330 | 26 |
| Regular | 12,670 | 39 | 9,670 | 24 | 2,040E | 25E | 24,380 | 30 |
| Total2 | 32,350 | 100 | 40,660 | 100 | 8,020 | 100 | 81,030 | 100 |
The information on the profile of children registered in English-language schools show that among the 45,700 children registered in English-language schools, most of them live in English endogamous families (55%), and approximately half of those are registered in a French immersion program (12,600 children). Those attending French schools mostly come from English-French exogamous families (77%).
In the case of children whose English-speaking parent has a language other than English or French as mother tongue, Table 5.13 shows that the vast majority of them live in endogamous families (83%). The others live in either other-English exogamous families or other-French families. Not surprisingly, for many of them, the parents are not rights holders, and consequently their children cannot attend English schools. In fact, the children registered in French-language schools (89%) come mainly from families in which both parents are allophones.
Finally, while nearly two-thirds of the 65,100 children who live in endogamous families where both parents have a mother tongue other than English or French are registered in French schools, the fact remains that 31% attend a minority school, and half of these children are registered in a French immersion program.
| Language of schooling | Type of family | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Endogamous Other-Other | Exogamous Other-English | Exogamous Other-French | Total1 | |||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||||
| French | 42,270 | 65 | 1,770E | 26E | 3,340 | 52 | 47,380 | 61 |
| English | 19,920 | 31 | 4,810 | 72 | 2,670E | 42 | 27,400 | 35 |
| Immersion | 10,210 | 16 | 2,870E | 43 | 1,130E | 18E | 14,220 | 18 |
| Regular | 9,710 | 15 | 1,940E | 29E | 1,530E | 24E | 13,180 | 17 |
| Total2 | 65,120 | 100 | 6,690 | 100 | 6,410 | 100 | 78,220 | 100 |
While attendance of minority schools is strongly associated with the parent's main language, the fact remains that parents who have English as a main language do not necessarily all make this choice. Thus, as shown in Table 5.14, of the 173 680 children for whom the main language of the parent is English, either alone or on an equal basis with French, only slightly more than half (53%) are registered in a minority school. When the parent has English as his or her mother tongue, the proportion of young people registered in an English school rises to 61%.
Moreover, of all children attending an English school, a very large proportion (97%) have a parent with English as a main language, 92% as the only language and 5% on an equal basis with French.
Of the children attending a French school, 76% have a parent for whom English is the main language, with 65% reporting that they are more at ease in that language and 11% reporting being equally at ease in English and French. Also, nearly one-quarter of children who attend a French school have a parent who, while belonging to the English-speaking minority, reports having French as the main language. In 59% of cases, these are parents with a mother tongue other than French or English8.
| Language of schooling | Main language of the parent | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| French | English | French and English | Total | |||||
| number | % | number | % | number | % | number | % | |
x suppressed to meet the confidentiality requirements of the Statistics Act Source: Statistics Canada, Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities, 2006 |
||||||||
| French | 22,580 | 88 | 63,710 | 41 | 11,190 | 67 | 97,490 | 49 |
| English | 2,770E | 11E | 86,310 | 55 | 4,920 | 30 | 94,010 | 47 |
| Immersion | x | x | 41,010 | 26 | 1,800E | 11E | 43,850 | 22 |
| Regular | 1,740E | 7E | 45,300 | 29 | 3,130E | 19E | 50,160 | 25 |
| Total1 | 25,720 | 100 | 156,990 | 100 | 16,680 | 100 | 199,400 | 100 |
Notes
- That is those who, under Section 23 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms can register their children in a minority language school. Outside Quebec, a parent is considered a rights holder when he or she is a Canadian citizen and satisfies one the three following criteria: a) their mother tongue is the minority language; b) they received their primary school instruction in Canada in the language of the minority; c) they have a child already registered in a minority school in Canada. In Quebec, the mother tongue criterion does not apply.
- Note that the numbers presented in this section represent approximations and should not be interpreted as to replace data on school attendance from provincial administrative data in Canada. Moreover, since the survey is about official language minorities, children who do not belong to these minorities and who do attend a minority school are not included.
- The remaining 5% corresponds, for the most part, to children who have left school or, to missing responses (refusal or 'don't know' cases).
- Only children whose parent and parent's spouse had a single response on mother tongue were considered for purposes of analysing this criterion.
- That is, those whose mother tongue is French.
- Refers to the cost of attending a private school not subsidized by the government.
- The residual portion consists of children attending schools that are neither French nor English.
- This result follows from the broad definition of official-language minorities used in the survey. Parents for whom both English and French are their first official language spoken are included in the sample.
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