Minority language schools and post-secondary accessibility

This paper reports on a comparative and longitudinal study of French-language minority access to higher education in Ontario, Canada. ne province of Ontario provides homogeneous French-language and bilingual 'mixed' schools at the elementary and secondary levels as well as bilingual institutions at the tertiary level. While French-language programmes are available throughout the province, English-language programmes and institutions are usually more accessible both geographically and regarding the depth and variety of programmes. In terms of an institutional analysis, experience has shown that in this particular minority language setting, it is the offer of minority language educational services that creates the demand, rather than the converse. Thus, the provision of French-medium programmes is followed by an increase in minority enrolments and the preference for French-medium programmes, even though English-medium programmes are more numerous and more convenient The reduction of French-medium programmes is followed by the decline of minority enrolments, even though francophones are clearly bilingual and in many cases even more at ease in English than in their mother tongue.