Features

{mosimage}MISSISSAUGA, Ont. - A bruising battle over funding with the provincial government behind it, the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board is now embarking on a thorough re-examination of its Catholic mission for the first time in 15 years.

{mosimage}VATICAN CITY - A transformation has occurred in Catholic schools over the last 50 years, and the Vatican took its measure at a recent press conference.

{mosimage}TORONTO - The Toronto Catholic District School Board has tentatively approved year-round schooling at two elementary and two secondary schools for the 2009-2010 school year.

{mosimage}MISSISSAUGA, Ont. - “Today we tell the world that Catholic education is indispensible,” said Ralph Borrelli in his welcoming address to more than 7,800 Dufferin-Peel District Catholic School Board teachers and staff on Nov. 7 in the first board-wide faith formation day in 20 years.

{mosimage}NIAGARA FALLS, Ont. - Niagara Catholic School Board, celebrating a “rich history,” acknowledged its roots and symbolically steered a course for years ahead with a gala anniversary dinner Oct. 24 in Niagara Falls.

{mosimage}Sex sells. That seems obvious enough to anyone who owns a television. But cultural critic Paul Rutherford has looked behind this most obvious truth about advertising to figure out how and why we have been sold so much stuff using so much sex.

Editor's note: After a bruising provincial election campaign that revealed deep dislike among Ontario voters for any form of government-funded religious schools, Catholic education supporters have a right to be nervous. Their own system came under attack and will now be under an unfriendly microscope. In these stories, we explore some of the issues and possible solutions.

Public funding for Catholic schools varies from province to province. Some are fully funded — Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Yukon Territory and Northwest Territories — while Manitoba and British Columbia receive 50-per-cent funding.

The rest of the provinces, Quebec, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and Nunavut, receive no funding for Catholic schools.

{mosimage}TORONTO - In a province where the government offers full funding for Catholic schools, there still exists a niche for self-funded private Catholic education, say supporters of independent schools.

TORONTO - The future of Catholic education in Ontario may be bound up with the Khalsa Community School for Sikh children in Malton, or Bialik Hebrew Day School in Toronto. Key figures in Catholic education are thinking about winning the debate over faith-based education by opening a non-Catholic religious school.