Access to data is always good

I've said it before... "If you're not measuring, you're not managing." Even the McSlippery Fiberals recognise this is true... but, regardless... they're gonna pretend they're not doing it...

The Ontario government is quietly laying the groundwork to collect ethnic, racial and other diversity data on two million elementary and secondary students in a controversial plan not yet made public.

So why do the Liberals want to keep this important initiative off the radar? Well, it's simply another... "Everyone is beautiful... in their own way" fuzzy-bunny moment.

The Liberal government of Dalton McGuinty pours $18.5 billion into the system annually, and has fretted over low performance and high dropout rates among children of certain racial or ethnic backgrounds – aboriginal, Portuguese, Vietnamese, Spanish-speaking and black (particularly Jamaican and Somali).

Among the questions researchers will face are how the information would be stored, accessed and disclosed, and what racial and ethnic categories would be used.

Never mind that the whole purpose of the exercise is to identify which groups of children are having difficulties... and to direct resources right to that specific demographic.

Under Ontario privacy laws, ethnic or racial details are considered personal information that must be authorized for collection and protected properly. A full description of how such data would be used is also required.

This is just so basic... it should have been done before this.

But unfortunately... in Dalton McSlippery's Ontario... we care more about "hurt feelings" than actually getting results.

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