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“Living a Philosophical Contradiction?”: Progressive Education in the Archdiocese of Vancouver's Catholic Schools, 1936–1960

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2019

K. M. Gemmell
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Abstract

Progressive education swept across Canada in the early to mid-twentieth century, restructuring schools, introducing new courses, and urging teachers to reorient the classroom to the interests and needs of the learner. The women religious who taught in Vancouver's Catholic schools negotiated the revised public school curriculum, determined to utilize the latest methods and meet public school standards in hopes of receiving government funding. But they were equally adamant about preserving Catholic beliefs regarding human life and resisting “false” philosophy. Despite their caution, progressive education began to transform Catholic pedagogy in this period, most notably in religious education. Looking back over the decades, Catholic educators in the early 1960s would observe that progressive education had brought about a shift in schools that emphasized process over content and self-expression over discipline. They found themselves questioning whether the curriculum undermined revealed knowledge by overemphasizing empirical science as the foundation for all knowledge.

Keywords

Catholic educationcurriculum historyprogressive educationwomen religiousPacific NorthwestBritish Columbia
Type
Articles
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 59 , Issue 3 , August 2019 , pp. 351 - 378
Copyright
Copyright © History of Education Society 2019 

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References

1 “Putman-Weir Survey,” The Homeroom, https://s.web.viu.ca/homeroom/content/topics/programs/progress.htm; and Putman, J. H. and Weir, G. M., The Survey of the School System (Victoria, BC: C. F. Banfield, 1925)Google Scholar.

2 Patterson, Robert S., “The Canadian Response to Progressive Education,” in Essays on Canadian Education, ed. Kach, Nick et al. (Calgary, AB: Detselig, 1986), 61–77Google Scholar.

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4 Patterson, “Canadian Response to Progressive Education,” 100. See also Tomkins, George S., A Common Countenance: Stability and Change in the Canadian Curriculum (Vancouver, BC: Pacific Educational Press, 2008)Google Scholar.

5 In this period, the Sisters of St. Ann referred to the region from Washington State to Alaska, including British Columbia and part of the Yukon Territory, as St. Joseph's Province. For statistics about Canadian congregations, see MacDonald, Heidi, “Smaller Numbers, Stronger Voices: Women Religious Reposition Themselves through the Canadian Religious Conference, 1960s-80s,” in Vatican II and Beyond: The Changing Mission and Identity of Canadian Women Religious, ed. Bruno-Jofré, Rosa, MacDonald, Heidi, and Smyth, Elizabeth M. (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2017), 26–63Google Scholar.

6 In the early decades of the twentieth century, they were joined by the Congregation of Christian Brothers; the Sisters of St. Joseph of Toronto; the Sisters of Charity of the Immaculate Conception of St. John, New Brunswick; and the Religious of the Sacred Heart, among others. In the 1850s, the Sisters of St. Ann and the Oblates of Mary Immaculate were the first to arrive in the region.

7 Barman, Jean, The West Beyond the West: A History of British Columbia, 3rd ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2007), 433–34, Table 10Google Scholar.

8 This area is often referred to as the Lower Mainland and typically includes the Fraser Valley, Greater Vancouver, the Sunshine Coast, and parts of Squamish-Lillooet. Since the 1930s, it has held over 50 percent of the province's population. See Barman, West Beyond the West, 437–38, Table 14.

9 In 1978, for the first time in their history, Catholic schools in British Columbia became subject to government inspection and regulation. Since 1989, Catholic schools have received 50 percent of a given local public school district's per-student grant amount, while remaining under church control. In the 2017–2018 school year, 22,162 students were educated in B.C. Catholic schools, representing more than one quarter of the 13 percent of British Columbia children who attend independent schools. See “Enrolment by Independent School Association—Historical,” Federation of Independent School Associations, https://fisabc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Enrolment-by-Assoc.-Historical-2018.pdf.

10 This is with the exception of Indian residential schools, which had received federal government funding since the late nineteenth century and, though required to follow the provincial curriculum after the 1920s, did not receive funding for high school grades until after World War II.

11 Research on the history of public funds for Catholic schools in English Canada has largely focused on the province of Ontario. See, for example, Dixon, Robert, We Remember, We Believe: A History of Toronto's Catholic Separate School Boards, 1841 to 1997 (Toronto: Toronto Catholic District School Board, 2007)Google Scholar; Walker, Franklin A., Catholic Education and Politics in Ontario, Volume III: From the Hope Commission to the Promise of Completion (Toronto: Catholic Education Foundation of Ontario, 1986)Google Scholar; Gidney, R. D., “The Completion of the Separate School System, 1960–1987,” in From Hope to Harris: The Reshaping of Ontario's Schools (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999), 124–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and McGowan, Mark G., “Nurseries of Catholics and Canadians: Toronto's Separate Schools,” in The Waning of the Green: Catholics, the Irish, and Identity in Toronto, 1887–1922 (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1999), 118–48Google Scholar. Literature on government funding for nonpublic (including Catholic) schools in British Columbia includes Downey, L. W., “The Aid-to-Independent Schools Movement in British Columba,” in Schools in the West: Essays in Canadian Educational History, ed. Sheehan, Nancy, Wilson, J. Donald and Jones, David C. (Calgary, AB: Detselig Enterprises, 1986), 305–23Google Scholar; Barman, Jean, “Deprivatizing Private Education: The British Columbia Experience,” Canadian Journal of Education/Revue canadienne de l’éducation 16, no. 1 (Winter 1991), 12–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Cunningham, Victoria, Justice Achieved: The Political Struggle of Independent Schools in British Columbia (Vancouver, BC: Federation of Independent School Associations, 2002)Google Scholar; Down, Mary Margaret, A Century of Service, 1858–1958: A History of the Sisters of Saint Ann and their Contribution to Education in British Columbia, the Yukon and Alaska (Victoria, BC: Sisters of Saint Ann, 1966)Google Scholar; and McNally, Vincent J., “Challenging the Status Quo: An Examination of the History of Catholic Education in British Columbia,” Historical Studies 65 (1999), 71–91Google Scholar.

12 On the history of women religious who taught and changes to their communities and Catholic education after the Second Vatican Council, see Danylewycz, Marta, Taking the Veil: An Alternative to Marriage, Motherhood, and Spinsterhood in Quebec, 1840–1920 (Don Mills, ON: Oxford University Press, 1987)Google Scholar; Smyth, Elizabeth, ed., Changing Habits: Women's Religious Orders in Canada (Ottawa, ON: Novalis Publishing, 2007)Google Scholar; Bruno-Jofré, Rosa and Zaldívar, Jon Igelmo, eds., Catholic Education in the Wake of Vatican II (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Bruno-Jofré, MacDonald, and Smyth, Vatican II and Beyond. On the history of Catholic education for Indigenous students in the West, see Gresko, Jacqueline, “Creating Little Dominions Within the Dominion: Early Catholic Indian Schools in Saskatchewan and British Columbia,” in Indian Education in Canada Volume 1: The Legacy, ed. Barman, Jean, Hebert, Yvonne, and McCaskill, Don (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), 88–109Google Scholar.

13 It should be noted that some scholars have included the Catholic response among other responses to progressive education, such as Nick Kach, “Criticisms of Progressive Education,” in Essays on Canadian Education, ed. Kach, et al., 121–40; and Fass, Paula S., “Imitation and Autonomy: Catholic Education in the Twentieth Century,” in Outside In: Minorities and the Transformation of American Education (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 189–228Google Scholar.

14 This research is based on newsletters, student work, and correspondence of the Sisters of St. Ann, Sisters of St. Ann Archives, (hereafter cited as SSAA); meeting minutes from the Vancouver Parochial School Council, Sisters of Charity, Halifax Archives, Halifax, NS (hereafter cited as SCHA); and correspondence, reports, and the B.C. Catholic newspaper from the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver Archives (hereafter cited as RCAVA).

15 In Canada, Kilpatrick's project method was more commonly referred to by the British term, “enterprise education.” Tomkins, Common Countenance, 174.

16 Canadian curriculum historian George Tomkins suggests Hubert Newland, supervisor of schools in Alberta, best exemplifies pedagogical progressives in Canada. Tomkins, Common Countenance, 174. For example, see Newland, H. C., “Report of the Supervisor of Schools,” in Thirty-sixth Annual Report of the Department of Education of the Province of Alberta (Edmonton, AB: Alberta Department of Education, King's Printer, 1941)Google Scholar. See also Dewey, John, The Child and the Curriculum (1902; repr., Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956)Google Scholar; Dewey, John, My Pedagogic Creed (New York: E. L. Kellogg, 1897)Google Scholar; and Dewey, John, Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (New York: Macmillan, 1916)Google Scholar. This paper focuses on the influence of pedagogical progressivism in Catholic schooling. Also in this time period, major reforms in measurement and efficiency, which were often referred to as “administrative progressivism,” dramatically influenced public and Catholic schools. See Tyack, David B., The One Best System: A History of American Urban Education (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1974)Google Scholar. Ann Marie Ryan, examining American Catholic schools, suggests that administrative progressivism was more influential. Ryan, Ann Marie, “‘More than Measurable Human Products’: Catholic Educators’ Responses to the Educational Measurement Movement in the First Half of the 20th Century,” Catholic Education: A Journal of Inquiry and Practice 13, no. 1 (Sept. 2009), 76–96Google Scholar.

17 Consequently many schools changed from an 8–3 system (eight elementary grades, three high school) to a 6-3-3 plan: six years of elementary schooling, three of middle school (which came to be known as junior high), and three of high school. This brought provincial public schools in line with schools in the United States. Johnson, F. Henry, A History of Public Education in British Columbia (Vancouver: Publications Centre, University of British Columbia, 1964)Google Scholar.

18 “Life adjustment education” was not identified as such, but nonetheless made its way into Canadian curriculum. William F. Pinar, “Introduction to the 2008 Edition,” A Common Countenance, xv.

19 This debate was sparked in particular by Neil Sutherland in “The Triumph of ‘Formalism’: Elementary Schooling in Vancouver from the 1920s to the 1960s,” BC Studies, nos. 69-70 (Spring-Summer 1986), 175–210; and Robert S. Patterson, “The Implementation of Progressive Education in Canada, 1930–1945,” in Essays on Canadian Education, ed. Kach et al., 79–96. Scholars are still exploring the definition and historical reality of progressive education in Canada. See, for example, Christou, Theodore, Progressive Rhetoric and Curriculum: Contested Visions of Public Education in Interwar Ontario (New York: Routledge, 2017)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 Axelrod, Paul, “Beyond the Progressive Education Debate: A Profile of Toronto Schooling in the 1950s,” Historical Studies in Education/Revue d'histoire de l’éducation 17, no. 2 (Fall 2005), 227–41Google Scholar; Stamp, Robert M., “Growing Up Progressive? Part I: Going to Elementary School in 1940s Ontario,” Historical Studies in Education/Revue d'histoire de l’éducation 17, no. 1 (Spring 2005), 187–98Google Scholar; and Stamp, Robert M., “Growing Up Progressive? Part II: Going to High School in 1950s Ontario,” Historical Studies in Education/Revue d'histoire de l’éducation 17, no. 2 (Fall 2005), 321–31Google Scholar.

21 Axelrod, “Beyond the Progressive Education Debate,” 240.

22 Heyking, Amy von, Creating Citizens: History and Identity in Alberta's Schools, 1905 to 1980 (Calgary, AB: University of Calgary Press, 2006)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

23 Cuban, Larry, How Teachers Taught: Constancy and Change in American Classrooms 1890–1980 (New York: Longman, 1984)Google Scholar. This is not to suggest that classroom instruction did not change in the twentieth century, but rather that the change was selective, not wholesale.

24 Cuban, How Teachers Taught, 253.

25 Perhaps the most widely-known Canadian opponent of progressive education was Hilda Neatby. See Neatby, , So Little for the Mind (Toronto: Clark, Irwin, 1953)Google Scholar. Neatby was a historian from the University of Saskatchewan and one of five members, and the only woman, of the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences in Canada from 1949 to 1951. She was deeply concerned with the relationship between culture and education and, after serving on the commission, published the above work, which caused a media sensation and was debated nationwide. For curriculum in the 1950s, see Stamp, “Growing Up Progressive?” Parts I & II; and Johnson, A History of Public Education in British Columbia, 167.

26 Exploring the rhetoric of progressive education, Theodore Christou observes the way Herbert Kliebard's three interest groups—those interested in child study and developmental psychology, social efficiency, and social meliorism—related to or worked with the concepts of active learning, individualized instruction, and the linkage between schools and society. Kliebard, Herbert M.. The Struggle for the American Curriculum 1893–1958 (Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986)Google Scholar. Christou argues that the social meliorists were less influential than those interested in social efficiency and child study and developmental psychology. Christou, Theodore, Progressive Education: Revisioning and Reframing Ontario's Public Schools 1919–1942 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

27 Milewski, Patrice, “‘The Little Gray Book’: Pedagogy, Discourse and Rupture in 1937,” History of Education 37, no. 1 (Jan. 2008), 91–111CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28 Gidney, R. D. and Millar, W. P. J., How Schools Worked: Public Education in English Canada, 1900–1940 (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2012), 363Google Scholar.

29 St. Ann's Journal, Sept. 1963 (S26-05), SSAA, 17; and Dewey, The Child and the Curriculum, 8.

30 St. Ann's Journal, Sept. 1963 (S26-05), SSAA, 19.

31 St. Ann's Journal, Sept. 1963 (S26-05), SSAA, 19–20.

32 Sutherland, “Triumph of Formalism,” 209.

33 “Catholic Education in the Vancouver Diocese” ca. 1936, superintendent's report (418–13), RCAVA.

34 Pius, Pope XI, Divini Illius Magistri: Encyclical Letter of Pope Pius XI on Christian Education of Youth (New York: Daughters of St. Paul, 1929)Google Scholar. Likewise, subsequent Pope Pius XII, when meeting with teaching sisters in the early 1950s, encouraged them to ensure that they possessed the quality of education and degrees required by the state. Pius, Pope XI, Counsel to Teaching Sisters (Washington, DC: National Catholic Welfare Conference, 1951)Google Scholar.

35 Pope Pius XI, Divini Illius Magistri, 60.

36 Kach, “Criticisms of Progressive Education,” 126; and Dewey, John, Logic: The Theory of Inquiry (New York: Henry Holt, 1939)Google Scholar.

37 In spite of their shared mission, women religious who taught have their own chronology and history that is distinct from the institutional church and the (male) Catholic hierarchy. See Danylewycz, Taking the Veil. In the area of education in particular, life in the convent was transformed in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as increasing numbers of women religious attended university. The “sister formation movement,” which emerged from the doctoral work of Sister Bertrande Meyers in 1941 and the (American) National Catholic Education Association in the 1950s, sought to address the need for professional, intellectual, and spiritual formation for religious sisters and had an unparalleled impact on the lives and work of women religious who taught.

38 On education for the Sisters of St. Joseph, see Smyth, Elizabeth, “Teacher Education within the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Toronto, Canada, 1851–1920,” Historical Studies in Education 6, no. 3 (1994), 97–113Google Scholar.

39 St. Ann's Journal, Summer 1936 (S26-03-1), SSAA.

40 For example, in September of 1938, the Sisters of Charity's superior at Seton Academy notified the archdiocesan superintendent that the students would be performing a short skit on September 24th and 25th that was taken from the “Summer School of Catholic Action” that some of the sisters had attended in August in Boston. Sister Agnes Camilla, SCH to Revered L. O. Bourrie, Sept. 12, 1938 (401–3), RCAVA. See also “Summer School,” St. Ann's Journal, April-May 1938 (S26-03-3), SSAA, 18.

41 Major H. B. King was a central figure in the British Columbia Department of Education behind curricular reform in the 1920s and 1930s and was the main author of the 1936 “Aims and Philosophy” at the heart of the new curriculum. The following year, he was appointed chief inspector of (public) schools. King, Herbert B., “Aims and Philosophy of Education in British Columbia,” in Programme of Studies for the Junior High Schools of British Columbia (Victoria, BC: Charles F. Banfield, 1936)Google Scholar, http://curric.library.uvic.ca/homeroom/content/topics/programs/aims37.htm.

42 Sister Mary Dorothea, “The New Programme of Studies,” St. Ann's Jounral, Aug. 1936 (S26-03-1), SSAA. Community prefects or superiors guided the teaching sisters, notifying them about changes and recommending resources and strategies for adjusting to the new programs of studies.

43 Letter from the Provincial Prefect of Studies Mary Dorothea to Sister Superior and Sisters, Sept. 21, 1936 (S19-03-3), St. Ann's Academy Internal Newsletters, SSAA.

44 “School Notes,” St. Ann's Journal, Aug. 1936 (S26-03-1), SSAA.

45 “Our Summer School,” St. Ann's Journal, Summer 1936 (S26-03-1), SSAA.

46 Letter from the Provincial Prefect of Studies Mary Dorothea to Sister Superior and Sisters, Sept. 21, 1936 (S26-03-1), St. Ann's Academy Internal Newsletters, SSAA. The objectionable texts are not listed by name.

47 “Social Studies,” St. Ann's Journal, Aug. 27, 1938, (S26-03-2), SSAA.

48 “School Notes,” St. Ann's Journal, Aug. 1936 (S19-03-3), SSAA. The Sisters of St. Ann also encountered progressivism in their ongoing study of education. Suggested readings on the psychology of education and character formation included books by Jesuit authors: McCarthy, Raphael, Training the Adolescent (New York: Bruce Publishing, 1934)Google Scholar; McCarthy, Raphael, Safeguarding Mental Health (New York: Bruce Publishing, 1937)Google Scholar; and Hull, Ernest, Formation of Character: the Child and the Boy (London: Sands, 1911)Google Scholar. Kelly's, William Educational Psychology (New York: Bruce Publishing, 1933)Google Scholar, written primarily for a Catholic audience, was also recommended; “Psychology of Education,” St. Ann's Journal, Aug. 27, 1938, SSAA.

49 “Special Notes—Grade IX,” St. Ann's Journal, Aug. 27, 1938, SSAA. They are responding to Section C “Modern Problems,” in the Department of Education curriculum bulletin series, 1937.

50 Letter from Provincial Prefect of Studies Mary Dorothea to Sister Superior and Sisters, Sept. 21, 1936 (S26-03-1), St. Ann's Academy Internal Newsletters, SSAA.

51 Letter from Provincial Prefect of Studies Mary Dorothea to Sister Superior and Sisters, Sept. 21, 1936.

52 Vancouver Parochial School Council Meeting Minutes, April 17 1937, SCHA; Dickie, Donalda J. and Palk, Helen, Pages from Canada's Story: Selections from the Canadian History Readers (Toronto: J. M. Dent, 1928)Google Scholar. Dickie published the only Canadian methods textbook on progressive education that was used in teacher education programs across the country. Dickie's writings reflect her close relationship with pedagogical progressives. Dickie, Donalda J., The Enterprise in Theory and Practice (Toronto: Gage, 1940)Google Scholar; and Heyking, Amy von, “Selling Progressive Education to Albertans,” Historical Studies in Education/Revue d'histoire de l’éducation 10, no. 1–2 (Spring 1998), 67–84Google Scholar.

53 Vancouver Parochial School Council Meeting Minutes, April 17, 1937, Sept. 17, 1938, and Feb. 15, 1941, SCHA.

54 “Education Week: Feb. 6–11,” B.C. Catholic, Feb. 5, 1938, 3, RCAVA.

55 “Education Week: Feb. 6–11,” 3.

56 “Education Week: Feb. 6–11,” 3. At St. Ann's Academy, Vancouver, the program was as follows: Primary classes: music, reading and dramatization, health; an exhibit: manual arts, color work, and health project. Grades III & IV: reading and dramatization, vocabulary drill, music, an exhibit: drawing and project work. Grade V: concert recitation, a health play: “Accident Prevention,” a social study [sic] project, and a spelling match. Grade VI: class recitation, a spelling match, music, project explanation. Grades VII & VIII: music, spelling (science terminology), literature (a dramatization), a project: “Romance of Scotland, The Chemistry of the Air.” Grades IX & X: Latin vocabulary match, St. Catherine's literary circle, religion, baseball match, work book exhibits. Commercial: students’ discussion on “Essentials in Business Proficiency,” dictation (business letters), shorthand vocabulary drill, and typing (technical drill).

57 Dickie, The Enterprise in Theory and Practice, 125.

58 St. Peter's School Prospectus, April 1960 (S98-3), SSAA.

59 “Canadian Prelate Explains Why a Catholic School and Outlines Its Religious Program” B.C. Catholic, Jan. 17, 1952, 6; Pope Pius XI, Divini Illius Magistri, 80; and Pope Leo XIII, Militantis Ecclesiae: Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII on St. Peter Canisius, Aug. 1, 1897, http://w2.vatican.va/content/leo-xiii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_01081897_militantis-ecclesiae.html.

60 For a brief history of Catholic theology, see Attridge, Michael, “From Objectivity to Subjectivity: Changes in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries and Their Impact on Post-Vatican II Theological Education,” in Catholic Education in the Wake of Vatican II, ed. Bruno-Jofré, Rosa and Zaldívar, Jon Igelmo (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017), 21–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The relationship between faith and reason is addressed in an encyclical: Pope John Paul II, Fides et Ratio: On the Relationship of Faith and Reason, Sept. 14, 1998, http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_14091998_fides-et-ratio.html.

61 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (more often referred to as CCD) was the diocesan department that oversaw religious education for children attending public schools.

62 “Proposed School Calendar 1937–1938,” memo from superintendent of Catholic schools to Catholic schoolteachers, (Chancery Office Fonds, 401–3), RCAVA.

63 L. O. Bourrie, “Our Aims of Education,” Oct. 24, 1936, memo from superintendent of Catholic schools, L. O. Bourrie to Catholic schoolteachers, RCAVA.

64 Ostdiek, Joseph H., Simple Methods in Religious Instruction (New York: Bruce Publishing, 1935), 44–51Google Scholar. See also “Methods and Procedures in the Teaching of Catechism,” and “School Notes,” St. Ann's Journal, Sept. 1936 (S19-03-3), SSAA. Writing in the community newsletter, Sister Mary Dorothea describes the approach of the new religion curriculum for the archdiocese. Her notes are taken largely from Ostdiek's catechetical reference text approved for use in the Archdiocese of Vancouver. Another pedagogically progressive approved reference text was Sharp, John K., Aims and Methods in Teaching Religion (New York: Benziger Brothers, 1929)Google Scholar.

65 Ostdiek, Simple Methods, 45; and “School Notes,” Sept. 1936.

66 Ostdiek, Simple Methods, 46.

67 “School Notes,” Sept. 1936.

68 Ostdiek, Simple Methods, 49.

69 “School Notes,” Sept. 1936.

70 Ostdiek, Simple Methods, 50.

71 Sister M. Octavia of St. Edmunds School, North Vancouver, to the Superintendent of Catholic Schools, Jan. 2, 1937 (Chancery Office Fonds, 401–3), RCAVA. The Sisters of the Child Jesus, who taught Indigenous students at several schools in the province, also taught in a parochial school in North Vancouver.

72 Vancouver Parochial School Council Meeting Minutes, April 5, 1939 and Sept. 1942, SCHA.

73 Letter from the Provincial Prefect of Studies Mary Dorothea to Sister Superior and Sisters, Sept. 21, 1936 (S19-03-3), St. Ann's Academy Internal Newsletters, SSAA. The long-term goal of uniformity among Catholic schools was felt with the Catholic superintendent's school visits (the superintendent acted as school inspector for Catholic schools). Teachers were required to post the name of the class on the outside of their classroom door, along with a timetable for the classes. Required on each teacher's desk: seating plans, class registers listing the students’ ages, covered textbooks with markers for the day's lesson, and an extra copy of the timetable. Teachers were to be prepared to conduct a lesson in the school inspector's presence, if called upon.

74 The Sisters of St. Ann taught in Port Angeles, WA in the Seattle Diocese from 1929 to 1946.

75 “Pedagogical Lecture,” St. Ann's Journal, mid-Sept. to mid-Oct. 1937 (S26-3-1), SSAA.

76 “School Notes,” St. Ann's Journal, 1937 (S26-03-2), SSAA. It is unclear whether this summer school was held in Vancouver or in the provincial capital, Victoria. In 1938, the Victoria Diocese hosted its first annual session of Summer School of Religious Instruction. However, the Vancouver Archdiocese summer sessions had been running since 1933 or earlier. “The Church's Stand on Education,” St. Ann's Journal, June, July, Aug. 1940 (S26-03-5), SSAA.

77 “Catechetical Display—Vancouver Schools,” St. Ann's Journal, Sept. 1938 (S26-03-3), SSAA.

78 For a photograph of the student council, see: St. Peter's School–Yearbooks–Mock-ups 1957–1960, box 1, files 1–2, St. Peter's School fonds, New Westminster Museum and Archives, New Westminster, BC.

79 Cuban, How Teachers Taught, 37. For more information on teacher-centered and student-centered classrooms, see Cuban, How Teachers Taught, 3–5.

80 Rejection of sex education was widespread in British Columbia. See Mona Gleason, “Sex Talk in the City Exhibition: Contextual Essay–History of Sex Education in Vancouver” (lecture, Museum of Vancouver, Vancouver, BC, March 12, 2012).

81 McLaren, Angus, Our Own Master Race: Eugenics in Canada 1885–1945 (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1990)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The magisterium had officially condemned eugenics three years before: Pope Pius XI, Casti Connubii: Encyclical on Christian Marriage, Dec. 31, 1930, https://w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xi_enc_19301231_casti-connubii.html. Conservative Catholics in the United States were likewise staunch opponents. See Leon, Sharon M., An Image of God: The Catholic Struggle with Eugenics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Liberal religious leaders sometimes supported the eugenics movement, particularly prior to Casti Connubii. See Rosen, Christine, Preaching Eugenics: Religious Leaders and the American Eugenics Movement (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

82 Weir spoke about eugenicists’ programs in Germany, twenty-seven states in the US, and in several other countries.

83 “Hon. Dr. Weir and Sterilization Address” B.C. Catholic, May 1, 1941, 1, RCAVA.

84 W. M. Duke to G. M. Weir, Jan. 31, 1946 (402–2), RCAVA

85 Duke to Weir, Jan. 31, 1946.

86 Duke to Weir, Jan. 31, 1946.

87 “Sex Education–A Delicate Matter,” B.C. Catholic, Feb. 13, 1947, 4, RCAVA; “Parents, Not Teachers, Are the Ones to Give Sex Education,” B.C. Catholic, Dec. 11, 1947, 1, 8, RCAVA; “Sex Instruction Is Not Always Sex Education,” B.C. Catholic, Feb. 24, 1949, 6, RCAVA; “Catholic Teachers Against Classroom Sex Education,” B.C. Catholic, April 28, 1949, 6, RCAVA; and “Sex Education–Catholic Viewpoint,” B.C. Catholic, Dec. 29, 1949, 6, RCAVA.

88 Duke to Weir, Jan. 31, 1946; and “Sex Education—A Delicate Matter.”

89 Parent support nights have been a feature of Vancouver Catholic schools’ approach to sex education in the first two decades of the twenty-first century. “Sex Instruction Is Not Always Sex Education,” 6.

90 “Catholic Teachers Against Classroom Sex Education,” 6; and “Sex Instruction Is Not Always Sex Education.”

91 “Catholic Teachers Against Classroom Sex Education,” 6.

92 Duke to Weir, Jan. 31, 1946.

93 “Sex Education—Catholic Viewpoint,” 6.

94 Kliebard, The Struggle for the American Curriculum, 260. See also Stamp, “Growing Up Progressive?” Parts I and II.

95 Gonzaga University in Spokane, WA, acted as a leader in Catholic higher education in the area. Several of the Sisters of St. Ann studied there. “Credo of a Gonzagan,” St. Ann's Journal, July 1951 (S26-04-5), SSAA.

96 “Credo of a Gonzagan,”

97 For articles on faith and reason, and the importance of religious education, see St. Ann's Journal, Jan. 1948–Oct. 1951 (S26-04-2), SSAA. In the 1950s, the B.C. Catholic newspaper published frequently on the dangers of Dewey and progressive education. See “New Zealand Scholar Says Dr. Dewey Wrecks Schools,” B.C. Catholic, Christmas 1950, 1, RCAVA; or “Catholic Educators Tinged by Deweyism,” B.C. Catholic, Feb. 26,1959, 6, RCAVA.

98 The brief was submitted on behalf of the Vancouver Archdiocese; the Dioceses of Victoria, Nelson, and Kamloops; and the Vicariate Apostolic of Prince Rupert and of Whitehorse. Brief of the Catholic Public Schools of British Columbia to the Royal Commission on Education, 1959 (395–9), RCAVA.

99 See Neatby, So Little for the Mind.

100 Father Ratchford, “The Philosophy of the Chant Report,” ca. 1960 (S24), notes from retreat given to the Sisters of St. Ann, SSAA.

101 Report of the Royal Commission on Education (Victoria, BC: Royal Commission on Education, 1960), 24Google Scholar.

102 Philosophy of the Chant Report, 5.

103 Philosophy of the Chant Report.

104 Philosophy of the Chant Report.

105 Cuban, How Teachers Taught, 137. Kliebard and Christou also describe hybridization in curriculum reforms in the 1930s (see footnote 27). Likewise, Patterson found Canadian progressivism to be conservative, homegrown, and selective.

106 Axelrod, “Beyond the Progressive Education Debate.”