Alberta needs to be healthy and wealthy

I attended a Wildrose meet and greet event in Red Deer where leader of the Wildrose Danielle Smith gave a talk and took questions. I went because I wanted to see and hear what the Wildrose are doing and what the people who would attend a Wildrose event are saying and thinking.

I was there to learn.

Danielle Smith talked about the ridiculous wages that some government administrators make like the head of Alberta Health Services or Redford's chief of staff.

Talking about income inequality is often a great way to get labelled a communist or a socialist, but when Danielle Smith and the Wildrose talk about government employees who make a ridiculous salary, they get head nods and hell-yeahs from Wildrose and NDP alike. 

Albertans who don't make six figures have a problem with public-sector employees who do.

Danielle Smith elicited gasps from the crowd when she said that the Alberta Union of Public Employees (AUPE) reported that many of their frontline members don't make $45,000 in an entire year -- which happens to be the cost of Alison Redford's flights to Nelson Mandela's funeral.

This hit home big time amongst the room of people in Red Deer -- I saw heads nodding everywhere. The tension in the room was escalating. If Smith was trying to elicit an emotional response, she hit everyone, including me, between the eyes.

Smith also talked about making Alberta's Heritage Fund a priority and pointed to Norway's Oil Savings Fund that now sits at over $900 Billion, compared to Alberta's $17 Billion.

That's some of what Danielle Smith and the Wildrose talk about.

Here's some of what Danielle Smith and the Wildrose don't talk about.

Like Smith and the Wildrose, I too am interested in what Alberta can learn from Norway. It turns out that Norway does a better job of saving money in the bank and keeping kids off the street. Smith and the Wildrose make a point to be envious over Norway's bank account, while ignoring their superior skills in keeping children out of poverty. I think Albertans care about both, and so should any political party worthy of governance.

The whole point of being fiscally responsible is born out of the idea that responsible adults don't run up a tab and then throw the bill at our next generation of children. If this matters, and it really does, then so does ensuring that our present generation of children don't live in poverty.

It is disingenuous to talk about government cronyism and then ignore Alberta's growing income gap and children living in poverty. (Did you know that the top Canadian CEOs earn average workers' salary in a day and a half?)

Anyone who wants to talk about fiscal responsibility or education without talking about reducing poverty has an agenda and should be challenged, and anyone who talks about social responsibility and reducing poverty without talking about balancing the books is irresponsible and should be challenged.

If we care about children, then we need to talk about fiscal and social responsibilities. For too long, Alberta political parties have been marinated in ideology that prioritizes one at the expense of the other. The ancient tug o' war between left and right over fiscal and social responsibilities is an old and tired political model that have many people angry, cynical or apathetic.

If you are a fiscally responsible and socially conscious Albertan who is looking for a different way of doing politics, then I invite you to check out Greg Clark and the Alberta Party.

Greg Clark and the Alberta Party believes, "we can have a strong economy. We can have a strong commitment to the environment. A strong balance sheet and a strong social conscience."

The Alberta Party understands that it is easier and cheaper to build strong children than to repair broken people. Their social policies reflect an understanding for the idea that an ounce of prevention can be worth a pound of cure.

The Alberta Party is a breath of fresh air that Alberta desperately needs.

Winston Churchill once said:

Show me a young Conservative and I'll show you someone with no heart. Show me an old Liberal and I'll show you someone with no brains.

While I give Churchill full credit for being pithy, this kind of black and white thinking holds us back. If Alberta is going to be healthy and wealthy, we have to stop choosing between having a brain or a heart.

Alberta needs both.

Alberta needs the Alberta Party.

You say you want this, so then why are you doing that?

If we can agree that there is a good chunk of the population that hated their time in school, then we need to think about how we can make school a little less like school. If the consensus among educators and parents is that we want lifelong learners then we need to play a little game called "You say you want this, so then why are you doing that?"

Here's how you play the game.

First: we have to be willing to admit that school can be improved. Then we need to admit that to improve school, we need to change school... check.

Second: we have to agree that we want children to become lifelong learners... check.

Third: we have to rethink some of the most recognizable characteristics of Old School such as homework, grading, rewards, punishment, discipline, hand raising, multiple choice, honour rolls, competition, testing, lecturing, standardization, lesson planning and curriculum... check

If you take the time to follow the links above you will see how each one of these traditional practices can be challenged.

If this game is bothersome or uncomfortable to play, that's ok. You're human. So if you need a little help, consider what Winston Churchill and Mark Twain had to say about this little game:

Churchill: However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.

Twain: It ain't what we don't know that get's us in trouble, but what we know for sure that just ain't so. 

The results are that the status quo of Old School is no longer sustainable. Many students continue to vote with their feet and leave school - what's sad is that for many students their time during school has them feeling less captivated and more just like captives.

In his article How to Create Nonreaders, Alfie Kohn chimes in:

When parents ask, "What did you do in school today?", kids often respond, "Nothing." Howard Gardner pointed out that they're probably right, because "typically school is done to students." This sort of enforced passivity is particularly characteristic of classrooms where students are exlcuded from any role in shaping the curriculums, where they're on the receiving end of lectures and questions, assignments and assessments. One result is a conspicous absence of critical thinking - something that (irony alert!) the most controlling teachers are likely to blame on the students themselves, who are said to be irresponsible, unmotivated, apathetic immature, and so on.

Unfortunately, myths are often more satisfying to us than the truth - in education we are satisfyingly distracted by a great many myths.

Do we not recognize that there are a lot of children who hate school?

For too long, school has acted for too many kids as the greatest extinguisher of curiosity. If we are serious about creating lifelong learners, school needs to stop looking so much like school. If we want to make things better for our children, we need to start questioning what we consider to be the obvious.

This is why the most successful parents and educators are constantly reflecting on their own beliefs and practices. They are in a constant state of acute mindfulness.

And it starts by asking the question: I say I want this, so then why am I doing that?

My slideshow:

You say you want this

View more presentations from bowerjj.