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The Greatest Challenge for Saskatchewan:
Education and Learning for Our Troubled Children

By Mario deSantis, March 6, 2000

Premier Romanow is shrinking this province to greatness and as long as his policy directions are driven by the so called Gross National Product (GNP) accounting, wealth will be further concentrated for the few and privileged(1). We have seen that GNP accounting cannot measure our well being in a society which is racist(2) and which is already divided as rural or urban. Our challenge today is not in being the best in the world in sub-atomic researches or in agricultural bio-technology(3). Our challenge today is not to fight racism either, our greatest challenge today is to provide social and educational opportunities to the 40% of all of our school children whose education is at risk because they are so poor(4).

These children have been labelled troubled children by our educational, political and business community, and unless we address the plight of these children, this 40% number will increase dramatically as the aboriginal young population experiences the highest demographic growth in the province(5). Our Premier stated that our children are our future(6), but what kind of future are we going to have with an increasing number of troubled children?

Some time ago I reached the turning point of my contempt against the textured corruption of our social environment when I realized that my own lawyer was working against my interest in a litigation. At that time, as my children were learning that our leaders can be pathological liars and that we cannot even trust our own lawyers, I began to reiterate my own version of the gospel to my children "don't care about money, don't care about paternalistic help, freedom through education(7)"

My sons James and Eric are working towards their freedom, and they are cherishing education and learning not only as a privilege but as a way of life. So, the education and learning of our children is our future, education and learning should be our way of life, and education and l earning will eventually break down our societal prejudices of being for instance "uber alles."

Our aboriginal people have been socially and economically marginalised, and at this time of rampant racism they cannot bank to solve this social endemic problem either through an RCMP investigation or through a public inquiry(8). Education and learning is the only answer, it is working for my children, it will work for aboriginal people, it will work for any good willing people, and it will work for all our troubled children. But where is our hypocritical Premier Romanow? Oh, I forgot, he is opening his mouth and speaking on TV to save our future of Medicare(9), here in Saskatchewan and across Canada.

Endnotes

General reference: Articles by Mario deSantis published by North Central Internet News

1. A World for the Few and Privileged in Saskatchewan, by Mario deSantis, February 18, 2000

2. Mayor Dayday's GNP Accounting: writing off our children, dumping people outside city limits, and building the Synchrotron, by Mario deSantis, March 1, 2000

3. Honourable Janice MacKinnon and the NDP Government: Spin-doctoring the Truth, by Mario deSantis, February 21, 2000

4. Saskatchewan Troubled Children: 40% of our school children, by Mario deSantis, January 14, 2000

5. Aboriginals poised to irrevocably alter political landscape, by Adam Killick, National Post, February 7, 2000 http://www.nationalpost.com/

6. Excerpts of Premier Romanow's Speech to the 1998 Provincial NDP Convention "...Friends, we are indeed fortunate that we live in a rich and generous society, where most of our children are cared for and nurtured. But we cannot rest so long as one child is shivering in the cold. So long as one child goes to bed hungry... The future lies in our children, and in their schools and this government stands behind our children and their schools..."

7. ELECTRONIC COMMERCE, INTERNET AND CULTURAL CHANGES, by Mario deSantis, July 24, 1998

8. Fanning the flames of racism. Saskatchewan's inquiry won't halt the trend to a permanent social divide, by Susan Martinuk, National Post, February 28, 2000 http://www.nationalpost.com/

9. Health-care hypocrisy, by Douglas E. Angus of the University of Ottawa, The Globe and Mail, March 4, 2000 http://www.globeandmail.ca/gam/Health/20000304/SALETS-3.html