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Sable, M. (1998). George Drew and the rabbis: Religious education in Ontario’s public schools. Canadian Jewish Studies, 6, 25-53.

• Keywords: Jewish, Toronto, exclusion, activism, relations, policy.
• Timeline: 1940s-1950s.
• Summary: Diverging views by Toronto rabbis on an attempt by the Conservative premier in 1950 to promote compulsory Protestant education. According to Sable: “The major change reflected in the Drew Regulation was that, for the first time, instruction in religious education was made compulsory in all public schools, up to and including Grade 8, for two one-half periods per week during the school day” (p. 26). As Sable notes: “Prior to the 1944 Drew Regulation, religious instruction was not formally part of the public school curriculum” (p. 27). When Jewish community leaders (Rabbi Feinberg) voiced opposition to the Hope Commission (in 1945), the commission was unresponsive (p. 32). Reflecting on the lasting presence of the Drew Regulation, Sable notes: “The Drew Regulation was one Ontario government’s wartime response to certain perceived societal ills. Yet, no matter that it was clearly discriminatory, no subsequent Ontario government mustered the political will to overturn it. Therefore, the Drew Regulation remained the law for forty-six years” (p. 41).

Schoenfeld, S. (1999). Transnational religion, religious schools, and the dilemma of public funding for Jewish education: The case of Ontario. Jewish Political Studies Review, 11, 115-139.

• Keywords: Jewish, education, funding.
• Timeline: 1990s.
• Summary: On the matter of paying (twice) for religious schools, Schoenfeld notes: “The inequity imposes financial penalties on parents who send their children to the hundreds of independent schools based in other religious traditions. Parents of students in Jewish day schools pay twice for education – once to the public system and once to the schools their children attend” (p. 133). Towards the end of the paper, Schoenfeld asks the following question: “If students are removed from the public school to state-supported schools which teach the priority of particular value systems over those of civil society, can the moral dimension of civil society be maintained?” (p. 134).

Sev’er, A. (1993). Anomie as powerlessness: sorting ethnic group prestige, class, and gender.’ Canadian Ethnic Studies, 25, 2, 84-99.

• Keywords: African-American, Chinese-Canadian, German-Canadian, Italian Canadian, Jewish, Ukrainian-Canadian, Caribbean, identity, Toronto, sex/gender.
• Timeline: early 1990s.
• Summary: A summary of the paper reads as follows: “In this Toronto study of seven ethnic groups we found that ethnic prestige and social class were major factors in predicting powerlessness and anomie. English Torontonians of higher social class and prestige scored on anomie, while West Indians who were lowest in class status and ethnic prestige scored the highest on anomie” (p. 84).

Shaffir, William. (1981). Chassidic Communities in Montreal. In M. Weinfeld et al (Ed.), Canadian Jewish Mosaic. Toronto: John Wiley & Sons Canada Limited. (pp. 273-287)

• Keywords: Jewish, education, community building, isolation, Montreal.
• Timeline: 1978-1981.
• Summary: Considering matters of curriculum and teacher hiring, Shaffir notes: “The way Chassidic schools organize their secular curricula exemplifies and deliberately perpetuates such a view of secular society. School administrators and community leaders arrange all secular studies so as to ensure that their content does not conflict with religious studies. To this end, they devote careful attention to both the hiring of teachers and the screening of the curriculum” (p. 280). Shaffir summarizes the aim of Chassidic education as follows: “Children, contend the Chassidim, must be raised with a Torah-grounded education, and deflections from this path either eliminated or carefully controlled” (p. 284).

Solomon, R.P. (1992). Black resistance in high school: Forging a separatist culture. Albany: State University of New York Press.

• Keywords: African-Canadian, activism, education.
• Timeline: 1980s-early 1990s.
• Summary: Highlighting the dimension of ethno-racial identity: “Solomon finds social reproduction and resistance theories inadequate in explaining the effects of structure and culture on the process and outcome of schooling for the minority-group students he studied. These theories emphasize the role of social class in their analyses and explanation and generally ignore or marginalize racial inequality in schools. But … he concludes that race (or racial inequality) is critical to an analysis of the educational problems of racial minorities” (p. 527).

Suzuki, D. (1988). Metamorphosis: Stages in a Life. Toronto: Stoddart.

• Keywords: Japanese-Canadian, internment, exclusion.
• Timeline: 1930s-1980s.
• Summary: Reflecting on the post-WWII era, Suzuki notes: “The final indignity was the refusal by the B.C. government to allow any Japanese to stay in the province after the war” (p. 74). Suzuki goes on to state that: “In the same year [1944], Prime Minister Mackenzie King announced his plans for the Japanese after the war – deportation and dispersion. He would set up a commission to examine the background and loyalties of all Japanese” (p. 74).