Many parents have pulled their children out, so many that the school may not be able to open next month. Bizarre as this scenario may sound, something like it could happen in the foreseeable future. Public education from kindergarten to grad school could be not only privatized but franchised, run like fast-food outlets. Advocates of for-profit education are brimming with energy and ideas, while most public educators at all levels seem either ignorant of the threat or in outright denial. Most Canadians have never heard of it, but our federal government has been quietly promoting GATS for years.
Education is such a service, and a very big business.
These enterprises do everything from creating software to designing curriculum to managing schools. Under GATS, they would have the right to compete with our own public schools. Yet public and commercial schools compete in Canada from pre-school to university, and that competition could make our whole school system vulnerable to rule by GATS and the World Trade Organization. If John Oliver Secondary gets paid so much per student, so must York House, and so must any foreign-owned private school. If Victoria supplies capital funding for public-school buildings and equipment, it must offer the same to private schools.