Toronto, Ontario, Friday, April 26, 2013

I’m thrilled to see all of you and grateful to the Canadian Club of Toronto for giving us this opportunity to gather together. A revered public institution for more than a century, the club has been a platform for generations of Canadians to meet, share ideas and mobilize our talents and resources to find responses to the most pressing concerns of our times.

This spirit of open-minded, collaborative problem solving brings me here this morning.

On the day of my installation as governor general, I made clear that I consider my tenure in this office a call to service, and that my wife Sharon and I intend to answer that call by bringing Canadians of all backgrounds and ages together to create a smart and caring nation.

A smart, caring nation is one that supports children and families, encourages philanthropy and volunteerism, and places the highest priority on learning and innovation. The word that connects these elements is inclusiveness.

Inclusiveness can be personal—between individuals and small groups of people. It can also be institutional. Inclusiveness on a national scale is determined by how we create our public institutions.

In Canada, we have enjoyed uncommon success in setting up political and economic institutions that enable our citizens to reach their full potential, experience true freedom and enjoy lives that are rewarding, fulfilling and meaningful.

Sharon and I have spent 30 months in office spurring Canadians to examine these pillars of inclusiveness in detail and uncover ways to make them increasingly real in their own lives, and in their neighbourhoods, towns and cities.

I can think of no better way for all of us to celebrate the 150^th anniversary of Confederation in 2017 than rejoicing in the knowledge that we all have made Canada an even better country in which to live, work and raise our families.

Those three pillars cover plenty of ground.

I would like to focus on one aspect of my pillars with you today—learning. Learning has been a personal passion and professional preoccupation of mine for 45 years.

I have spent my whole adult life—as a university professor, manager and executive—consumed by thoughts that revolve around how men, women, youth and children gain, expand and use knowledge.

The past two and a half years have given me a different perspective from which to view my ideas and gain a greater appreciation of the history and current state of learning in Canada and its value to Canadians into the future.

I’d like to share some of these reflections with you in the hope that my thoughts will provoke deep discussion and creative solutions by Canadians. Analysis and action are needed. We cannot be content with the state of learning in Canada. We must aim higher.

Why must we have greater aspirations?

First, our education system, while it performs well compared to other countries, is uneven across our country. We must make sure people of all ages, regions, incomes and backgrounds have access to the people, tools and resources that make education consistently current, practical and inspiring.

Second, we’re being undermined by our own complacency. When we permit “good enough” to be our goal, we have no incentive to assess our performance regularly, so we condemn the state of learning in our country to drift steadily downward.

We must combat complacency by striving for excellence in the way we teach and learn, and by applauding and profiting from those who achieve excellence.

Third, we’re being carried ahead by the galloping pace of technological change and uncovering vast amounts of new knowledge about learning—particularly on the workings of the human brain. We must embrace this new knowledge and technological change and use them to propel learning in Canada.

When I think of learning and change in all its forms, I’m reminded of the words of writer Eric Hoffer. He wrote that, “In times of change, learners inherit the Earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.”

Since all times are times of change, Hoffer’s brief sentence prompts us to appreciate that education must always prepare learners for the world that’s coming. In this way, his words echo what business executive Alfred Perlman said many decades ago: “Learning is what most adults will do for a living in the 21^st century.”

So exactly what goals must we set for ourselves with regard to learning?

Hugh MacLennan, one of our country’s great novelists, once called Canada a nation of losers. It was a salute, not a slur. He meant that many of us came to Canada from abroad—many fleeing war, hunger or oppression in their homelands—to make better lives for themselves and their families.

The most important avenue for advancement and success for generations of Canadians has been public education. It didn’t come about by accident. We Canadians made it a priority and worked hard to bring it to life—harder than most other nations.

The great thing about Canadian education is how inclusive it is—from kindergarten to post-secondary institutions. We Canadians—and our ancestors for generations before us—made a deliberate choice. We chose not to use education to perpetuate elite groups or a ruling class.

As a result, we made public education a path to success for generations of native-born Canadians and wave upon wave of immigrants. Equality of opportunity in learning also enabled whole communities to flourish. Our pioneer ancestors knew its power. They were quick to build churches and schools as soon as the land was cleared and barns and homes constructed. The seed of this wisdom was sown in generations that followed—right up to our very own.

As a teacher, administrator and executive, I’ve seen and experienced the power of public education to transform lives and enrich our country. Most of the successes I’ve enjoyed in my life spring directly from the high-quality education that I received.

Yet this path to success is closed to many Canadians. We lack full equality of opportunity in learning.

• The calibre of education in some regions of our country falls well below that of other regions. The same holds true for the disparity between many remote as opposed to urban parts of Canada.
• The resources available to richer districts within metropolitan areas are often much greater than those at hand in poorer ones.
• Barriers to learning confront visible minorities and new Canadians.
• And we continue to fail to recognize and take full advantage of the educational and professional qualifications of recent immigrants.

Most troubling is the large segment of children who are failing—through no fault of their own—to use their educations as springboards to personal fulfillment and career success.

Levels of education can be broken down into five categories that range from primary to post-secondary. Canadian children exceed their parents’ levels of education at a higher rate in the top four categories. In those categories, our country is among the best performers in the world when it comes to enabling our children to outperform their parents. Success in learning breeds further success.

The opposite is true for children of parents in the lowest segment of educational attainment. These children are far less likely than other children to exceed their parents’ level of education. Among the OECD countries of the world, our own ranks as one of the worst performers when it comes to enabling children in this category to outperform their parents.

If we look at learning as a game of Snakes and Ladders, the 20 per cent of children in this bottom category are sliding further down while their peers in the other groups are climbing.

We must recommit ourselves to the idea of equality of opportunity in learning. By Canada’s 150^th birthday in 2017, we must close the gaps in learning between remote and urban, rich and poor, new and native-born, and make sure all children—whatever the educational levels of their parents—are in a position to enrich their lives through learning. We must ensure all Canadians get a first-rate education and use it—as did Hugh MacLennan’s nation of losers—as a path to success.

I spoke earlier about some of the persistent gaps that exist in learning in Canada. The gap in achievement between Canada’s indigenous and non-indigenous people is so vast that it’s a chasm.

This gulf leads me to an inescapable conclusion: Despite many committed educators and some great successes, Aboriginal education has failed First Nation communities, failed Canadians and, most of all, failed First Nation boys and girls.

This fact saddens me deeply. First Nation children and young First Nation men and women have endless amounts of talent, creativity, energy and drive.

Yet a high number of First Nation students drop out of school—and the number is climbing. Sadly, the situation is not much better for those who stay in school. Far too many graduates leave school without the basic knowledge they need to qualify for skills training, let alone go on to college or university.

This failure means many young First Nation men and women are unable to get jobs, start careers and contribute to the growth and prosperity of their communities.

What makes this condition even more troubling, many young First Nation men and women live in communities located in resource-rich areas of Canada where skills shortages are especially acute.

On another level, the glaring inequality in educational outcomes between First Nation and non-First Nation people undermines the inclusiveness of our political and economic institutions—our businesses, governments, laws—diminishing our country and preventing it from reaching its full potential.

So what must we do to ensure more First Nation students stay in school, graduate, get quality educations and are prepared to make meaningful contributions to their communities and country? We must first come to grips with the reasons why Aboriginal education is in such a state.

We in Canada are managing an educational system that doesn’t work rather than showing the leadership needed to create and sustain a system that does work.

When I say we, I mean all of us—First Nation and non-First Nation alike, educators and non-educators, those in our governments and those outside them. I’m not here to point the finger of blame at anyone. I simply want to help Canadians arrive at understanding and find solutions.

My experience has taught me five lessons.

First, we must ensure every decision our schools and school authorities make, and every action they take, serve students and make their education as authentic, accessible, relevant and broad-minded as possible.

Second, we must make sure all players in the system are encouraged to experiment and take reasonable risks. Encouragement comes through rewarding experiments and risks that produce results, by not penalizing good-intentioned new approaches that fail, and by enabling men and women to learn what works from their peers.

Third, we must encourage all schools and school authorities to search for partners who can help further our mission of building high-quality schools that graduate every single student with the knowledge they need. These partners can range from individual elders to nearby provincial school boards to large private-sector organizations and companies.

Fourth, we must hold ourselves accountable for the decisions we make and the actions we take. When we don’t hold ourselves to account for our failings, we have little incentive to change course. Accountability is the engine that drives adaptation and eventually improvement.

And fifth, we need to discard stereotypes and old views, and recognize the people who live with us today, who speak to us from the headlines, who are asking for opportunities, inclusion and respect.

My views echo some key findings and recommendations of the report of the three-person panel on kindergarten to grade 12 education for Canada’s indigenous people that was chaired by Scott Haldane.

Panel members have shown the leadership we need, blazing a trail toward a system of First Nation education that can close the gaps in graduation rates and learning outcomes between First Nation and non-First Nation students. By Canada’s 150^th birthday, we must be walking confidently down that path.

Excellence should also be our goal throughout our education system. No reason exists why we in Canada should not enjoy the finest learning environments in the world and produce the most fertile minds in the world.

Equality of opportunity in learning enables us to nurture these original minds by expanding and thickening the critical mass of ingenuity from which high achievers can emerge.

We must also take action to celebrate exceptional achievements in teaching, learning and research. We fulfill a series of special responsibilities when we illuminate the extraordinary achievements of our finest thinkers.

• We inspire the emerging generation of young Canadian scholars to intensify their work.
• We speed the transfer of knowledge across borders and disciplines, enabling it to be tested, shaped and refined into timeless wisdom.
• We reveal the impressive power of teaching, learning and research to find answers, solve problems and improve lives.
• And we frustrate the creation of a pervasive culture of anti-elitism that can suffocate aspiration and achievement.

Competing for and winning international prizes is one key way we promote excellence in learning in Canada. I recently convened a group of 11 eminent Canadians to uncover fresh approaches that we can follow to encourage and then support Canadians to compete for international prizes in learning, research and innovation.

I’m taking every opportunity of my own to promote extraordinary achievements in learning. Earlier this week, nearly 200 guests joined Sharon and me at Rideau Hall as we honoured this year’s winners of the Killam Prizes. We celebrated the accomplishments of the five laureates in such a public way to illuminate exceptional successes in learning for all our country and all the world to see.

Yet I realize this celebration of excellence merely begins our efforts to produce an education system of unparalleled excellence. We must take action across the full spectrum of learning—from preschool to the highest echelons of research; from structured learning to an all-encompassing culture of lifelong learning.

• We should step up our game in international education and outlook.
• We should encourage greater innovation in our post-secondary institutions.
• We should reconsider the schedule and purpose of primary and secondary education.
• We must create a sound Canadian head-start policy for children under the age of five.
• We must develop new ways of learning that take full advantage of emerging new information and communications technologies.
• We must find better ways to move people from school to work and better ways to equip people with the skills they need to thrive in modern workforces.
• We must use our emerging understanding of the workings of the human brain to foster enhanced learning methods, especially as these methods apply to children with learning disabilities and special needs, and those with special strengths.

In the months and years to come between now and Canada’s 150^th birthday in 2017, we Canadians must continue this discussion and begin to craft approaches and solutions to the challenges I’ve raised here today.

I don’t profess to have all the answers. As scholar Martin Palmer pointed out, “The secret to mastery in any field is to forever be a student.”

Let us all take those wise words to heart. Let us all remain students in spirit as we aim higher, as we aspire to reach greater goals for learning in our country, as we continue on our shared mission of building the smarter, more caring nation we all hope for and dream of.

Thank you.