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New Vancouver School Policy: Parents Refused Right to Pull Kids from Pro-Homosexual Lessons

By John Jalsevac

VANCOUVER, B.C., June 25, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Vancouver school board has announced that it intends to enforce the B.C. Ministry of Education's policy that forbids parents from removing their children from the classroom during pro-homosexual discussions.

The school board announced their staff-recommended decision this past Friday. A spokesman for the board said, in the board's defence, that the board was simply falling in line with Ministry guidelines. 

"We're expected to do that (enforce the policy) by the (Education) ministry, so it's not something we've initiated of our own volition," said Ken Denike, a Vancouver school board trustee, according to Canwest News.

"It's a very touchy subject," he admitted, saying that the board expected some backlash from disgruntled parents. "It has to be handled sensitively. It's going to be difficult."

The province of British Columbia has been subjecting its curriculum to a complete revamp in the last several years, largely under the supervision of a homosexual "married" couple, Murray and Peter Corren.

In 1999 the Correns filed a human rights complaint against the B.C. Ministry of education, alleging that the Ministry's curriculum didn't adequately "address issues of sexual orientation." Subsequently the Ministry made a settlement with the Correns in the form of a contract that gave the couple an unprecedented level of control over the development of the province's revamped, pro-homosexual curriculum. Under the Correns direction, a host of new and redesigned courses in various subject areas that include positive portrayals of "alternative sexualities" have been introduced in B.C.

One aspect of the new curriculum that the Correns insisted on was a stipulation that B.C. parents could not choose to remove their children from the classroom during discussions on homosexuality - a stipulation that, in the end, the B.C. Ministry of Education agreed to.

Currently, therefore, parents are only permitted to pull their children out of health classes that deal with "alternative sexualities." However, pro-homosexual material appears all throughout various courses in the new curriculum, and not only in the health classes. And even in the case of the health classes, children who do not attend are still required to learn the material either at home or through independent study, and to prove that they have learned it.

The Catholic Civil Rights League (CCRL) has been fighting the new curriculum, and in particular its Draconian opt-out prohibition, since it was first announced that the province would be reworking the curriculum with the Correns.

The League has pursued a letter-writing campaign asking the various schoolboards around the province to state whether or not they intend on enforcing the Ministry's prohibition on parents pulling their children from classes they deem offensive. As of this past March 22, responses from districts representing almost half the province's school population indicated that they would not compel students to attend classes over the objections of their parents.

"In the end," said Sean Murphy, a director for CCRL, in March, "only two districts in the province seem clearly willing to enforce the coercive section of the Corren Agreement."

The Vancouver school board, however, has now added itself to the list of boards who have thought it expedient to deny parents their right to act as the primary educators of their children, in the name of political correctness.
  
Ed Da Vita, a spokesman for the CCRL, told the National Post about the Vancouver board's recent decision to enforce the policy, "The problem now is that controversial subject matter can be brought up any time, anywhere, and there is no reasonable alternative delivery available for that."

To contact the Vancouver school board about its decision:

Superintendent of Schools
Mr. Chris Kelly
Office of the Superintendent
1580 West Broadway
Vancouver, BC
V6J 5K8
604-713-5100
604-713-5412
e-mail: ckelly@vsb.bc.ca

See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Canadian Bishop Calls Parents to Action against Homosexual Indoctrination in Schools
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/sep/06090706.html

900 Protest in Vancouver Over Homosexual Activist Control of Gay Curriculum in Schools
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/aug/06082807.html

Gov't Agrees to Mandatory Homosexual Curriculum with No Opt-Out for Students or Parents
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/jun/06060101.html

B.C. Gay Couple Seeks Mandatory Homosexual School Curriculum Without Parental Opt-Out
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/jul/05071106.html

Documents Reveal Government Signed Over Control of Education to Homosexual Activists
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/jun/06061907.html

B.C. Parents Denied Access to Debates on Controversial Pro-Gay High School Course
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/oct/06101002.html

BC Parents Will Have to Lie to Keep Kids out of Gay Advocacy Curriculum
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/sep/06091307.html

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