Scott
09-22-2007, 03:53 PM
Sep 22, 2007 04:30 AM
Kristin Rushowy
Education Reporter
The call to prayer comes each afternoon at 1:30 p.m.
Younger students at ISNA Elementary School slip off their shoes in class and walk quietly, in stocking feet, down the hall to their prayer space ? which doubles as the library ? as older students descend from upstairs to join them. A male student, always, carries out the call, over the school's p.a. system.
Five minutes later, they've settled into their prayer lines, with boys at the front of the room, girls behind. (Kindergarten students, however, mix freely at the back.)
It's not the only time boys and girls are separated. Students in grades 4 through 8 ? around the time of puberty ? sit at opposite sides of the classroom, in some cases a vast empty space in between. Sports for the older grades, too, are segregated.
Principal Obaid Yarkhan says the school preaches gender equity and doesn't discourage talking between the sexes; they are seated separately because of "religious etiquette."
ISNA Elementary in Mississauga, with 260 students, is one of the private, religious schools that hopes to be a part of the public system, as proposed by the Ontario Conservatives should they win the October election.
Alright, there has always been that complaint in Canada that Catholic elementary and high schools get government funding. Now if Tory is elected, Islamics along with other religions will be getting their own funding too, I could not believe what I'm hearing. If you ask me this is just going to create more internal problems and create an internal Islamic pride, stopping them from assimilating. Lets face it, they're hated enough, we all know it and see it. This is just another step towards more of that. The more you leave them alone without assimilating the more the strongly keep old tradition. Nothing wrong with keeping tradition but you have to adjust your life to the way people are living here. They can't expect us to go out of their way just for them. There has been all kinds of religions in Canada and nothing has grabbed more attention than Islam.
Personally, I have no problem with Catholic schools because the majority of the population is Catholic or from other sector of Christianity.
Source (http://www.thestar.com/OntarioElection/article/259330)
Kristin Rushowy
Education Reporter
The call to prayer comes each afternoon at 1:30 p.m.
Younger students at ISNA Elementary School slip off their shoes in class and walk quietly, in stocking feet, down the hall to their prayer space ? which doubles as the library ? as older students descend from upstairs to join them. A male student, always, carries out the call, over the school's p.a. system.
Five minutes later, they've settled into their prayer lines, with boys at the front of the room, girls behind. (Kindergarten students, however, mix freely at the back.)
It's not the only time boys and girls are separated. Students in grades 4 through 8 ? around the time of puberty ? sit at opposite sides of the classroom, in some cases a vast empty space in between. Sports for the older grades, too, are segregated.
Principal Obaid Yarkhan says the school preaches gender equity and doesn't discourage talking between the sexes; they are seated separately because of "religious etiquette."
ISNA Elementary in Mississauga, with 260 students, is one of the private, religious schools that hopes to be a part of the public system, as proposed by the Ontario Conservatives should they win the October election.
Alright, there has always been that complaint in Canada that Catholic elementary and high schools get government funding. Now if Tory is elected, Islamics along with other religions will be getting their own funding too, I could not believe what I'm hearing. If you ask me this is just going to create more internal problems and create an internal Islamic pride, stopping them from assimilating. Lets face it, they're hated enough, we all know it and see it. This is just another step towards more of that. The more you leave them alone without assimilating the more the strongly keep old tradition. Nothing wrong with keeping tradition but you have to adjust your life to the way people are living here. They can't expect us to go out of their way just for them. There has been all kinds of religions in Canada and nothing has grabbed more attention than Islam.
Personally, I have no problem with Catholic schools because the majority of the population is Catholic or from other sector of Christianity.
Source (http://www.thestar.com/OntarioElection/article/259330)