Or maybe not....isn't this political suicide?

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ N.B. turns down ombudsman request for delay in axing French immersion 6 hours ago FREDERICTON — The New Brunswick government is not backing down from its controversial decision to scrap early French immersion, despite a request for a delay from the province's ombudsman. Premier Shawn Graham and Education Minister Kelly Lamrock said Thursday change is urgently needed in the province's school system, where literacy scores are among the lowest in Canada. "The greatest risk of all is accepting a 50 per cent illiteracy rate in New Brunswick and thinking that somehow that won't come back to harm us as a society," Lamrock told reporters. The Liberal government is under fire from critics across New Brunswick and Canada who are condemning the decision to axe early French immersion as a huge gamble in the nation's only officially bilingual province. The New Brunswick government has removed the early immersion option for the coming school year, although children already in the program can continue. An intensive French course will be offered to all English school children beginning in Grade 5, with a French immersion program beginning in Grade 6. New Brunswick ombudsman Bernard Richard announced Thursday that he will investigate the move, which he said could have far-reaching effects on French-English relations in New Brunswick. "I'm personally compelled to look at this issue," said Richard, a prominent Acadian and a former education minister in Frank McKenna's Liberal government. "New Brunswick has seen a sea change in the relationship between the two linguistic communities over the past four decades. I've lived through that. Any change that puts that at risk is a tremendous gamble." Richard said he can only make recommendations to the government, and his first suggestion was a one-year delay in introducing the changes. "That would be the fairest thing to do at this point," he said, noting that his office has received more than 200 complaints about the decision. But Graham shot down that idea in the legislature. "This government is elected to make policy," he said. "This decision will stand for implementation this September." Lamrock, who is bilingual, is staunchly defending his plan to change the school system in New Brunswick, despite protests, countless letters of complaint and even public discord in the ranks of the Liberal party. Only about 20 per cent of school kids in New Brunswick have been able to make use of the early immersion program, which was never offered universally. The remaining 80 per cent of the province's students have ended up in English core classrooms that were overcrowded and ill-equipped to handle the many special needs children with learning disabilities. Lamrock said the arrangement has led to a segregated and streamed system, where a few lucky parents were able to shield their children in early immersion classrooms. He said the changes will give all kids a better chance to learn the fundamentals. "It's Christian and right - if it works for a few, share it with the many." According to Literacy New Brunswick, about 60 per cent of the province's working-age people lack the literacy skills deemed necessary for coping successfully in today's information-based world.