Report finds more Canadians shunning government school system

A growing number of Canadians across the country are giving up on the government education system, says a new report from a conservative think-tank in the Great White North.

According to the Fraser Institute’s report entitled “Where Our Students are Educated: Measuring Student Enrolment in Canada,” private school enrollment is up 17 percent, while government school enrollment has gone down eight percent.

The study discovered that enrollment soared in independent schools and decreased for government schools in nearly every province between school years 2000/2001 and 2012/2013.

“While education is funded and delivered differently across the provinces, we’re seeing a greater number of parents in the vast majority of provinces choosing to have their children educated outside of the public school system,” said Deani Van Pelt, study author and director of the Fraser Institute’s Barbara Mitchell Centre for Improvement in Education.

Here is a breakdown of some of the provinces:

– Ontario: Independent school enrollment increased 9.4 percent.
– Quebec: Independent school enrollment skyrocketed 18.1 percent.
– Saskatchewan: Independent school enrollment soared 34.2 percent.
– Alberta: Independent school enrollment went up 30.6 percent.
– British Columbia: Independent school enrollment inched higher by 24.4 percent.

In Canada, only five provinces, at least in part, fund the operating costs of private schools.

“In Ontario, more and more parents are choosing to take on additional financial burden to send their children to private schools,” Van Pelt said. “While education in public schools is still the dominant form of education in Canada, the data indicates parents are increasingly looking to independent schools for more choice in how their children are educated.”

In Ontario, the province spends between $12,000 and $20,000 per child on education. During the 1990s, the province used to offer parents a $3,500 tax credit, arguing that it would help reduce the burdensome cost of the government school system. The tax credit was later vanquished by then Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty.

Watch economist Walter Block dismantle the government school system: