Building On Success: Looking To The Future
Canadian Parents for French BC & Yukon
2013 - 2018 Action Plan For FSL Education in British Columbia
September 27th, 2013
227 C – 1555 W 7th Avenue
Vancouver BC, V6J 1S1
www.cpf.bc.ca
OVERVIEW
French second language education in BC is, by all accounts, a success story.
During a period of overall student enrolment decline, French immersion enrolment has, for 15 consecutive years, increased. According to the 2011 Federal census over 300,000 British Columbians self-identify as being able to speak French, making French one of the most commonly spoken languages in our province. A majority of these British Columbians benefited from FSL education. Second and even third generation French immersion graduates are now returning to FSL education as parents and teachers. French immersion education is now a tried, tested, and proven program delivery model; public awareness about the strengths and benefits of the program only continues to grow.
Moreover, support for bilingualism has overwhelmingly swayed in favour of French second language education. According to a 2007 CROP poll, 88 per cent of Canadians believe that people who speak more than one language are better prepared to succeed in today’s global economy. The poll also showed that two thirds of Canadians felt that Canada’s two official languages help define what it is to be Canadian. In an era of great interest in other languages, including Mandarin and Punjabi, to name a few, French language education continues to enjoy great parental and government support. A key opportunity moving forward is to continue to position FSL education as a “gateway to multilingualism.”
Another important area of progress in recent years has been the number of working partnerships between Francophone associations and Francophiles. This past year alone there were 14 socio-cultural collaborations between CPF Chapters and local francophone associations. This rapprochement has resulted in a greater appreciation for French language and French culture, amongst tens of thousands of FSL students. Francophone-Francophile partnerships have, and will continue to contribute significantly to the vitality of a French linguistic space in our province.
Finally, within a trend of declining volunteerism within our society, Canadian Parents for French BC & Yukon enjoys record levels of parent participation in promoting and creating French language and cultural opportunities. This past year, 145 CPF parent volunteers dedicated 3,600 hours to host 71 French socio-cultural events and activities in school communities for youth.
In short, our education system and our province have been enriched by hundreds of thousands of students who have been supported in their pursuit to learn, use, and appreciate the French language and culture. The Roadmap for Canada’s Official Languages and the BC Ministry of Education’s 2009/2010 – 2012/2013 French Action Plan have had an important and considerable impact in a number of domains, particularly: student participation, provision of programs, and enriched school environment.
Despite considerable achievements, CPF BC & Yukon recognizes key areas for continued improvement vis-à-vis the offering of FSL education in our province:
- Too many families who wish to participate in and be enriched by French immersion programs are being denied access for a host of reasons (lack of classroom space, lack of teachers, etc.); funding formulas are needed to incentivize the creation of new programs.
- Too many students are dropping out of Core French and French immersion at the early high school grades; this requires further study and concerted multi-stakeholder efforts to be corrected.
- Too many families do not continue to participate in FSL education because they believe their child with a learning challenge will not succeed; these parents need to be equipped with the appropriate research and FSL students with learning challenges need better learning assistance support.
- Too few elementary and middle school teachers teaching Core French in our education system feel comfortable teaching French; this has and will continue to hurt student participation and quality instruction.
- Too few school districts have active French Advisory Committee/Councils; the allocation of Federal French Funds to school districts should carry a requirement that school districts have active FACs to review funding allocations and develop and monitor district FSL action plans, amongst other functions.
- There is currently a lack of language proficiency targets and benchmarks for both FSL teachers and FSL students; following in the leadership of the Yukon Ministry of Education, BC curriculum should set CEFR-based proficiency targets for FSL teachers and students.
- Access to quality FSL programming remains a challenge in rural communities where there is a lack of critical mass to continue FSL programs through to graduation; FSL online learning courses offered through LearnNow BC need to be analyzed to asses impact, attrition rates, improved (as may be necessary), promoted, and expanded as needed.
The purpose of this CPF BC & Yukon 2013-2018 action plan is to establish the current state of FSL education in our province and to outline a plan to improve the quality and accessibility for FSL education over the next five years.
CPF BC & Yukon looks forward to assisting the BC Ministry of Education to develop the priorities, objectives, and activities for a motivational, and yet achievable, 2013 – 2018 French Action Plan vis-à-vis French Second Language education in BC.
SUMMARY OF CPF 2013 - 2018 ACTION PLAN PRIORITIES
Domain: Student Participation
1. Increase the number of new and/or additional FI programs where there is sufficient demand;
2. Support students with learning challenges to participate in FI education;
3. Increase FI student retention at high-risk grade transitions (7 – 10);
4. Increase Core French student retention at high-risk grade transitions (8-10);
Domain: Provision of Programs
5. Legislate Core French from Grades 5 – 8;
6. Develop a 5 Year Strategy to improve and/or replace Core French;
7. Increase online tutoring & online FSL program availability;
8. Introduce French immersion programs to BC Global Education Schools;
9. Increase accountability & oversight of Federal French Funds;
Domain: Student Performance
10. Develop language proficiency targets and benchmarks for FSL teachers and FSL students;
Domain: Enriched School Environment
11. Enrich student learning and cultural appreciation through community-based socio-cultural programming;
12. Engage, Connect, & Support FSL Youth.
DOMAIN: STUDENT PARTICIPATION – FRENCH IMMERSION
Context
An ambitious French program for non-francophone students, French immersion is designed to produce functionally bilingual students by using French as the language of instruction. French immersion programs parallel the regular English program in structure and content.
French immersion enrolment in BC has been increasing at an average rate of 4.1% for the past 15 years. The growth in French immersion has been fuelled by parents looking to register their children in a strong, reputable, second language immersion program. Parents have different motivations for registering their children in this incredibly popular program of choice; this much is undeniable. Our goal as a parent-lead organization must be to continue to educate all parents about French second language (FSL) program delivery models, the benefits of bilingualism, the accessibility of FSL education to students with learning challenges, and to continuously strive to create new programs where there is sufficient demand.
Baseline
Of the 46 school districts that offered French immersion, 28 districts offered a late immersion program, and 40 offered an early immersion program. Nineteen school districts offered both programs. Thirteen school districts, excluding SD 93 Conseil scolaire francophone, did not offer any French immersion programs.
As of 2012/2013 a total of 47,857 public school students were enrolled in French immersion programs, accounting for approximately 8.5% of the total public school student population.
Interestingly, French immersion participation - as a percentage of total student enrolment - is as high as 17.51% in Greater Victoria (SD61), and 15.80% in Campbell River (SD72).
Attrition Analysis
Despite an increase in enrolment, attrition in French immersion programs has seen little improvement in the past five years. The attrition rate between Grade 1 to 5 has dropped by less than 3% since 2008 (17.3% to 14.6%), while the Grade 7 to 12 attrition rate has remained constant (42.1% to 42.0%).
Attrition is highest between Grades 7 and 8, resulting in both the highest number of students who leave the program as well as the highest attrition rate. In 2012-2013, 15% of students (648 students) who were in Grade 7 in the previous school year did not continue on to Grade 8.
One difficulty in calculating attrition at the secondary level is the fact that some students choose to complete the French immersion diploma in Grade 11 rather than in Grade 12. As a result, these students may not be accurately accounted for in the data below.
Additionally, since program entry generally occurs in Kindergarten and Grade 6, with some entry in Grades 1 and 7, attrition rates could not be calculated from Kindergarten through to Grade 12. These limitations resulted in two grade ranges: 1 to 5 and 7 to 12.
What this analysis demonstrates is that there is considerable student attrition amongst a few key ‘high-risk’ grade transitions; namely from grades 7 – 11. It’s important to note that French immersion student attrition rates vary considerably from school-district to school-district. For example, Comox Valley (SD 71), Sooke (SD 62), Kamloops-Thompson (SD 73), and Central Okanagan (SD 23) all have statistically low grade 7 – 12 FI attrition rates: 10%, 14%, 16.1%, and 20.1% respectively. The provincial average is 42.23%.
Clearly there are a number of best practices being employed by these school districts that require further study and to be shared with educators, and parents, across the province.
DOMAIN: STUDENT PARTICIPATION – CORE FRENCH & INTENSIVE FRENCH
Context
Core French is a subject designed to enable non-French speaking students to begin to understand and communicate in French, as well as to experience Francophone culture. Core French as a course has been in the BC curriculum for over 35 years; however the Language Education Policy, in place since September 1995, requires another language to be taught from Grade 5 to Grade 8. This policy ensures that for a minimum of four years students will take a second language course. French is the language most frequently offered.
Intensive French has been introduced in some school districts in British Columbia (Rocky Mountain SD 6, Surrey SD 36, Vancouver SD 39 and Mission SD 75), as an innovative approach to teaching and learning French. Intensive French is an enhancement of the Core French program.
Despite the incredible growth in French immersion programs, Core French enrolment has been declining at a faster rate than total public school enrolment since 2005. Between 2003 and 2011, Core French enrolment has declined by 16.3%, while total enrolment has declined by 5.8%. Because Core French classes are not mandatory, a possible explanation for this decline could be that more students are enrolling in other language programs.
Baseline
Only two out of 60 BC school districts (Nisga’a SD 92 and Conseil scolaire francophone SD 93) did not offer a Core French program in the preceding school year. Four of the 58 districts that offered Core French also offered Intensive French. In 2010-2011, 187,964 students were enrolled in Core French, making up almost one third (32.5%) of the public school student population.
In 2011-2012, 191 students in four districts were enrolled in Grade 7, 8, and 9 Intensive French.
Attrition Analysis
The highest attrition for Core French occurs between Grades 8 and 9, and 11 and 12. In 2010-2011, just under half (45.5%) of all Grade 8 Core French students did not continue on to Grade 9. The Grade 8 to 9 transition is where the program loses the majority of its students, as 14,755 Grade 8 students did not continue on to Grade 9 French in 2010-2011.
Grade 9 is typically when students in the English program are able to select other language courses; therefore, it is likely that the majority of students who did not continue with Core French have chosen to enroll in another language class.
The highest attrition rate in Core French occurs between Grade 11 and 12, where 63.1% of Grade 11 Core French students do not go on to finish Grade 12 French. One explanation is that most high school graduation requirements only require a second language up to Grade 11, so it is likely that the majority of students do not complete Grade 12 French because it is not mandatory for graduation.
In the summer of 2013, CPF surveyed 18 school district French/Modern language coordinators to better understand the reasons for this high Core French student attrition between grades 8 – 12.
64.7% of school districts indicated a lack of interest among students as a challenge to retention. The majority (58.8%) of school districts also identified a lack of qualified teaching staff. This finding mirrors a 2007 UBC study in which only 22% of the surveyed elementary school Core French teachers and 29% of middle school Core French teachers reported ease in conversing in French.
One district representative specified that the lack of French language proficiency was concentrated within staff at the intermediate level, and if students do not have a good experience with early levels of Core French, then they are not likely to continue at the secondary level. Other district representatives listed conflicting schedules at the secondary level, and competition with other language courses.