Being Misled: Misleadership (Part 3)
Categories: Misleadership Series, Léo’s Insights 2018-2019 Academic Year
Tags: leadership, GSA
In the first instalment of this series, I talked about how we are often purposefully misinformed, usually towards having us normalize and accept something that would never have been accepted in the first place.
Next, applying what we had learned in the first session, I proposed how noble causes can be created, manipulated and misdirected to advance an ulterior goal.
In this session, I want to show how we are often being misled to trust things that just ain’t so.
Now, you can be forgiven if you are a bit fuzzy as to how being misdirected and being misled are different. It is really just a matter of direction. Being misdirected is being pushed into doing something by being told things that are not true. Being misled is being pulled into accepting something by withholding important information that would have caused someone to do otherwise.
A recent example of people being misled involves how schools providing for home education have responded to Bill 10 and Bill 24 respecting Gay-Straight Alliances (GSAs). The follow-up Ministerial Order to comply or lose accreditation and/or funding, forced school boards into deciding whether prioritizing faith or compromising it for funding was in the school’s long-term best interest.
It should come as no surprised that nearly every school providing for home education chose to capitulate to the Ministerial Order despite their claiming, not only a faith-based foundation, but also their opposition to the Minister’s directives. It is not difficult to comprehend why pretty well all of these compromising schools have actively withheld this information from their parents.
It goes without saying that home educating parents are busy and simply do not have the time to look seriously into this matter. Most are only aware of what information is being provided directly by the employees of the school and in conversation with others, irrespective of the fact that all schools are instructed to make their GSA policies known through the school’s web site.
I should make mention that I am not questioning the implementation of GSAs, in this case, but how schools claiming to be against the Minister’s version of them are not acting in keeping with what they are saying. Not walking the talk is everywhere known as hypocrisy, which is my greater concern.
A good example of how a school is misleading its families occurred as these concerns were being aired on social media. A private school principal took to the forum advising parents not to pay attention to all the gossip and hearsay, but to go directly to their school administrators for their information.
It should be obvious that if parents are concerned enough to contact a leader respecting this issue, they would likely leave if they knew the school has compromised the faith for funding.
How many schools would openly admit that they have given the Minister everything he has demanded in his not-so-veiled attempt to disenfranchise parents and denigrate the Christian as well as other religious faiths? Would parents get truth from these “leaders” or would it more likely be withheld or masked?
If the objective behind withholding information is to keep individuals from knowing what would likely cause them to go elsewhere, it is safe to assume that if a school would compromise the faith to assure continued government funding, it would be highly unlikely to risk financial loss by fully informing parents of its decision. Better to mislead the parents.
How many parents take the time to look beyond what is being presented to them by their facilitator and/or provider? How many would get the truth if they actually took the time to ask? For that matter, can parents be sure that their own facilitator is truly informed or aware of what his/her employer has done?
The only way parents would know what the school has done respecting this issue is to avoid asking those who have everything to lose by telling the truth and go directly to the school’s web site and read the policy for themselves.
Realizing that most home educating parents are generally concerned about this issue and probably way too busy to be able to do a lot of research, we have taken the time to do it for you. The information presented in an article entitled “Bill 24 and the Alberta Home Educator,” which can be found in the Current Issues section of Education Unlimited’s website, is intended to simplify your task in obtaining clarity in this matter.
We encourage all home educators who are being challenged by what has transpired in home education to make a serious effort to know what their home education provider and/or school has been doing.
If you are serious about your faith convictions, you will want to choose a home education provider that has stood in opposition to all that has come against private Christian and home education.
You should also know that some of the schools named in the application for an injunction to Bill 24 had already acquiesced to the Education Minister’s demands before they ever got to court. No one within the home education industry has made this information readily available.
Again, go to the above mentioned article, “Bill 24 and the Alberta Home Educator,” and research the options available, keeping a close eye on what your school or potential school has done respecting the latest Ministerial Order and make a wise decision to not get involved in compromising any part of your faith through complicity with agencies that have.
Previous Post: Being Misdirected: Misleadership (Part 2)
Next Post: Being Misrepresented: Misleadership (Part 4)