A new Francophone school announced for Abbotsford

Earlier this month, the B.C. government announced that it had acquired land to build a new Francophone school in Abbotsford for $26 million. 

“Francophone students in British Columbia deserve opportunities to learn and thrive in a school environment that reflects their language and culture,” said Adrian Dix, minister of energy and climate solutions and minister responsible for Francophone affairs, in the announcement. “These investments show our government’s continued commitment to supporting the vitality of the Francophone community and ensuring that all students have access to high-quality education close to home.”

Despite the apparent commitment to offering French language studies, the province’s press release glossed over the fact that it has been a long and challenging road for Francophone parents in B.C., made even more difficult by the government’s reluctance to build more Francophone schools. 

In 2013, the Fédération des parents francophones de C.-B., the Conseil scolaire francophone (CSF)—B.C’s French-language school board—and parents of Francophone students filed a lawsuit against the B.C. government, alleging that it was violating the Charter rights of Francophone residents by failing to provide a sufficient number of French-language schools that offer the same quality of education as English-speaking schools. 

Not only are there too few schools, but they are not up to the same standards, the suit claimed. For example, the only Francophone primary school in Chilliwack currently is École La Vérendrye, which lacks many of the facilities found in English-speaking schools. 

“It’s a small school. There’s no proper gymnasium, all of those things show that our kids are not educated at the same level as kids that go to an English school,” said Corinne Blanchette, a French-Canadian parent of two in the Fraser Valley. 

The lawsuit continued with many appeals until it reached the Supreme Court of Canada, which ruled in favour of the Fédération, CSF, and Francophone parents in 2020. 

According to the ruling, the province was in violation of the children’s Charter rights and was ordered to add new Francophone schools and ensure they met the same standards as other schools in B.C. 

In 2022, the Current reported on the cost of building and maintaining new Francophone schools in B.C., which Blanchette believes is one reason why the province has resisted building French-language schools. High-standard new schools are expensive to build and run, and with competing demands for resources such as healthcare services, Francophone education has taken a back seat. 

For Francophone parents, maintaining an education for their children in French is not just a matter of acquiring language skills, but an essential part of preserving their culture.

“When in a minority linguistic context, if kids don’t receive their education in the minority language, they’re not going to be exposed to it as much, and they’re not going to retain it,” Blanchette said. “So to maintain the attachment to French culture with the knowledge of it, the school is absolutely essential for transmission, a link that has to be there.”

While many Francophone residents of the Fraser Valley are French-Canadians who have moved to B.C. from Quebec, they are increasingly becoming more diverse. 

“It’s way more diverse now because there are more and more families that come from Francophone African countries. I think we’ve got people from all continents, maybe except for Oceania,” Blanchette said. “There are families that come from European countries, families from Africa, and families from Quebec and New Brunswick.”

According to Statistics Canada, 76,370 British Columbians speak French regularly at home, but the existing schools are not enough to accommodate their children. Many parents have resorted to sending their kids to French-immersion schools, which they find inadequate for their needs. 

French-immersion schools are geared towards children from primarily English-speaking families who want to improve their French-language skills. If the province were to build more Francophone schools, that could free up more space in French-immersion schools for English-speaking students who wish to acquire French-language skills. 

For her part, Blanchette welcomed the news that B.C. is planning a new Francophone school in Abbotsford, but she wonders if the school will be built fast enough for her youngest child to attend it. Blanchette lives in Agassiz and works in Abbotsford, and her child has a one-and-a-half-hour commute each way to school in Chilliwack. A new school in Abbotsford would make a huge difference, she says. However, it may be years before the school opens. 

“I was very excited when I learned the news. It was actually a journalist from CBC French in Vancouver that shared the news with me that she wanted my reaction, because I have spoken publicly about the issue for years,” Blanchette said. “I almost didn’t believe it.”