NORTHWEST TERRITORIES POISED TO DROP ALBERTA’S CURRICULUM FOLLOWING KENNEY’S REWRITE

EDMONTON – The Northwest Territories government is preparing to drop the Alberta curriculum after more than 40 years of partnership, in response to the widely-criticized rewrite by Jason Kenney’s UCP government, Alberta’s NDP Caucus has learned.

The territorial government will instead move to British Columbia’s curriculum. The move follows a series of scandals about Chris Champion, a former Jason Kenney federal staffer, who pushed hard to remove Indigenous content, delay teaching about residential schools, and return to a 1950s-era rote memorization of European history. Champion has called First Nation perspectives in school a “fad.”

Minister Adriana LaGrange was absent from Question Period yesterday. Children’s Services Minister Rebecca Shulz spoke in her place and repeatedly refused to answer whether or not Alberta’s neighbor was dropping the curriculum.

“The Education Minister has botched her handling of Alberta’s curriculum,” said NDP Education Critic Sarah Hoffman. “She invited the Premier’s racist friends to hold the pen and didn’t blink when she heard they want to erase the history of Indigenous people in Alberta in favour of more European history. It’s no wonder other governments want nothing to do with Alberta’s racist curriculum redesign.

“Adriana LaGrange has smeared Alberta’s good name, and she owes Albertans an answer about why our fellow Canadians, people who share our values, want no part of her curriculum update when given the choice to use another province’s content.”