GSA report gives hope for legislative changes
Posted Mar 3, 2015 11:28 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The numbers have now been officially released and it appears the majority of Albertans support gay-straight alliances in schools.
The Rocky Mountain Civil Liberties Association recommends schools allow the clubs after a survey of a few thousand people in the province showed 83 per cent support GSA’s in public schools and 77 per cent supports GSA’s in the separate system.
The report comes out the same day Premiere Jim Prentice echoed that he wants to bring the debate back to the legislature during the spring sitting.
Association president Kelly Ernst said he would be surprised if they didn’t see legislation that adopts their main recommendation, for GSA’s to be allowed in all schools.
“Where we’re going to see contentious issues rise is if the MLA’s go further than that and start talking about parental rights or religious rights, and so on, and put that in the bill as well,” Ernst said.
The association also recommends the Alberta Human Rights Act be amended, specifically the parts which allow parents to keep their kids out of classed which discuss topics like religion or sexual orientation.
Ernst said repealing that part of the act would be a good start.
“If you think about what a purpose of a school is, is to teach children to be able to deal with all of the issues that they’re going to face in the world and shutting down debate on specific issues is very, very counter to that.”
The hearings behind the report took place in both Edmonton and Calgary in January with public presentations and written submissions.
The idea was to explore how human rights may be addressed by GSA legislation in Alberta.
Presenting the results Tuesday evening was Austin Bender, who received the Governor General’s Canadian Caring award for founding a GSA at Springbank Community High School in Calgary.
Ernst said he feels the presentation was well received and, at the very least, he believes the report has the ears and eyes of those who have the power to make changes.
