September 11, 2001 will forever be etched in the memory of Canadians who were deeply affected by the events of that day. This cataclysmic occurrence had a pivotal place not only upon the private troubles of those directly related but also upon the public issues and the consequent public policies of all of us who may not have been as directly touched. Such a life-changing experience will impinge upon the politics of our entire nation. The terrorist act was a political statement at one level which must be addressed politically as well It is noteworthy, given this context of the terrorist attack in the nation to the South, that October 8, 2001 represented the thirtieth anniversary of the political declaration of multiculturalism as a public state policy within Canada What difference does the official policy discourse and ideology of multiculturalism make in the political response to the ethnocultural and racial diversity within and without its national borders?

Since the early 1960s, large numbers of Haitians have emigrated from their native island nation. Changes in federal immigration legislation in the 1970s in both the United States and Canada enabled immigrants of colour a facilitated entry into the two countries, and this factor contributed to the arrival of Haitians to the North American continent. These newcomers primarily settled in cities along the eastern seaboard, in Boston, Miami, Montréal and New York. The initial motivator of this two-wave Haitian migration was the extreme political persecution that existed in Haiti under the iron-fisted rule of the Duvalier dictatorships and their secret police (popularly known as the “tontons macoutes”) over a thirty year period from the late 1950s to the mid 1980s.

This essay examines trends in education that affect Canadian schools.