Saint John's School of Alberta

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Saint John's School of Alberta
Image:St John's School of Alberta.jpg
Location
near Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Coordinates 53°22'50.5"N ; 114°17'4.7"W
Information
Religion Anglican (conservative), unofficial
Head teacher Jason Coates
Enrollment

60 boys
Student:teacher ratio 1:15-18
Type residential, boys
Campus R.R. #5
Stony Plain, Alberta
T7Z 1X5

PH (780) 429-4140
FX (780) 848-2395
Patron saint(s) John
Color(s) red, grey
Established 1967
Homepage http://www.sjsa.ab.ca/

Saint John's School of Alberta (SJSA) is a private school in Stony Plain, Alberta, Canada, the last of three private boarding schools founded on conservative Anglican ideas and the notion that children were not challenged by present-day society. Ted Byfield was instrumental in establishing the school. Byfield's attitudes toward children notoriously involve ideas of control, unfailing obedience, and "traditional methods" of discipline including corporal punishment. The school's historic use of "swat sticks" (0.5 metre long pieces of wood, often with carved handles)[1] has been defended by Byfield as being among the positive and character-forming aspects of the schools[2], c.f., lawsuits, below. The other (defunct) schools were Saint John's Cathedral Boys' School in Selkirk, Manitoba (near Winnipeg), and Saint John's School of Ontario[3].

The school is conservative in social and religious outlook, and controversial. Some policies have changed over the years, including no longer spanking students with the wooden paddles for homework errors. However underlying attitudes and ideology are not changed. Punishments include forcing students to run long distances or lift logs from one pile to another. The school continues to have a rigorous outdoor education program with snowshoe training and races (now shortened from the original one-day 16 hour races of 50 miles/80 km), canoe trips and other outdoor excursions. The school has always wanted to push students to their physical and psychological limits; the wildnerness excursions emphasize endurance and challenge. The students are required to participate in three core programs: academics, outdoor, and work (chores). The school has no janitors or physical plant support staff, assigning the students to clean and look after the property. The school has 60 students from grades 7 to 12, a reduced number from the past when enrollment was up to 130. In many ways, the school appears to resemble the boot camp programs for adolescents, and has been listed on government topographical maps as a correctional facility. Tuition fees are listed on the school's website as ranging from about $9,000 for day students to $23,000 for residential students. Virtually all of the students are residential.

It is run by a religious order called the Company of the Cross[4], which is claimed to be a lay order of the Anglican Church of Canada. The relationship to the church is presently unclear, possibly changed over time from specific church control and sponsorship [5] to what may be now, informal, i.e., presently it is not acknowledged or listed on any official document of the Anglican Diocese of Edmonton[6] or Anglican Church. The school calls itself nondenominational[7]. Avoiding inclusion in lawsuits is the usual reason for a church to not have a formal relationship or oversight of a school. Twelve children and one teacher died at the Ontario school during a canoe trip on Lake Timiskaming in 1978, and one child died while on a snowshoe march at the Manitoba School in the 1970s. Lawsuits were not laid for those deaths. The ideology of pushing children to their limits appears borne out with the deaths on school excurisons.

Contents

[edit] Criminal charges

A teacher from St. John's school of Alberta, Paul Nordahl, was charged with one count of assault causing bodily harm in 1990. (see Edmonton Journal article, Thurs, Feb. 15, 1990 "Boy's school prof. charged in assault" )

[edit] Child welfare investigations

In January 1990, Alberta Family and Social Services conducted an investigation that was obtained by a freedom of information request. This is a summary of the document that is available in full form in Wikisource.

Summary:

Complaint received from former student that discipline at St. John's school is done with a three foot long board and often results in bruising. Only male teachers are permitted to "swat" boys, and detailed records are kept. Child Welfare Act defines acts which cause bruising as physical abuse. St John's School is a private high school, southwest of Edmonton, with about 130 students and 30 staff.

— 19 January 1990 report, number 90024-0173 Alberta Family and Social Services[8]

A boy complained to child welfare authorities that the school's discipline of him with a 3 foot long stick, measuring 1 by 4 inches had caused bruises. The investigators examined the child, and found bruising consistent with the measurements of the stick. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) investigated because causing bruises in such circumstances is considered infliction of bodily harm. The investigators noted that prior complaints were received before 1983. The investigation noted that 6 children had run away to avoid the physical punishment of being hit with the sticks, and this was known to the RCMP from previous reports. It was also noted that older children physically assaulted younger children during supervision of chores and other activities. The Wikisource document should be consulted for complete details. The document also contains an initial heavily editted response by the school, also obtained by freedom of information request (the indication of "SEC. 17" in the document indicates censored information with the freedom of information request).

[edit] Lawsuits

The school was sued for $3.5 million in 2003 by Jeffrey Richard Birkin regarding "psychological and physical mistreatment" on a "new boy wilderness trip" in 1976. The claim listed direct physical abuse involving being hit by teachers causing physical injuries, and having been subjected to degrading and humiliating treatment [9]. The outcome of the lawsuit is not clear, possibly a negotiated and sealed settlement. Founder Ted Byfield admitted to levels of teacher conduct in the past that would be considered excessive and worthy of criminal charges if they occurred today [10].

The school had been previously sued in 1996 by Matt Riddel who lost 9 toes on a 4 day, 50-kilometre snowshoe and dogsled trip during which temperatures dropped to -28 degrees C. [11]. A teacher at Saint John's Cathedral Boys' School was jailed for sexual abuse of students in the 1980s [12].

[edit] The Old Boys, television documentary

From The Old Boys a television documentary broadcast by CBC Manitoba on February 28, 1990 (produced by Stephen Riley; reporter was Robert Enright) interview subject was Patrick Treacy, who spent four years at the Manitoba school during the 1970s. Treacy was deemed by staff at the time to be one of the best students there.

Treacy: "It was a place of anger for me, and I didn't realize that anger until much later, either. A great deal of anger"
Enright: "Was that because of the threat of physical violence?"
Treacy: "Yeah, I feel it was, yeah. And I just didn't want to go through that rather undignified bending over and being swatted for something. And it hurt! It hurt an awful lot. They weren't fooling around when they hit us, y'know? And it was really somewhat demeaning. They would order you in a really loud tone to 'Get the instrument of punishment.' So you'd be running around trying to find this stick. This is what they're going to hit me with! So it was kind of sadistic, you know?"

[edit] Company of the Cross archives

(source: Stephen Riley, archives, St. John's Cathedral, Winnipeg), p. 2: From an undated document entitled "The student and the Master"

"The Necessity of Discipline"
We are, as Christians, supposed to know the world and be able to cope with it. One of the greatest temptations put forth by the world is to buy its fantasy picture of reality. This fantasy would have us believe that
a) all people are basically good;
b) that we don't have to work to eat;
c) that getting the work finished is more important than how well it is done;
d) that carelessness won't end in tragedy;
e) that children know what is best for them.
Discipline is necessary in every society to keep it functioning because human nature is not basically good."

(from the same document, p. 15, comes a warning to the staff that each member must be consistent in applying the policy on discipline. It says there is no room for "Mr. Nice Guy."):

"1. You know school policy, follow it.
2. If it offends you aesthetically - leave and quit undermining everyone else.
3. If you want to stay, change before you are asked to leave."

(from the same document, p. 17):

"spanking is permissible in class or study but be aware of two things:
1) If you fear a confrontation , don't try it.
2) Don't humiliate a boy and make him cry in front of the group."

[edit] Frank Wiens

From a story by James Quig in Weekend Magazine, no. 5, 1968, p.6 quoting Frank Wiens, (headmaster and co-founder of St. John's Cathedral Boy's School, Selkirk).

"It's the toughest school in North America, if by tough you mean the most demanding of its pupils. One third of those who start Grade 6 will finish Grade 12. We push them to death... grind them into the ground".

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ^ Picture of a Saint John's School of Alberta swat stick with cigarette for scale, accessed 22 Sept 2007, link from http://www.corpun.com/picpar.htm, paragraph entitled "St John's School paddle (with cigarette for scale)" part-way down the page is not hyperlinked
  2. ^ 1996 Alberta Report article by Ted Byfield, accessed 22 Sept 2007
  3. ^ Unofficial school webpage accessed 12 Aug 2007
  4. ^ Alberta Education listing, accessed 08 Sept 2007
  5. ^ Company of the Cross. "St. John's/Company of the Cross Annual Report", 1971. "In legal fact the company is two companies, each operated under the auspices of an Anglican bishop, one in Manitoba under the bishop of Rupert’s Land, the other in Alberta under the bishop of Edmonton. Since the bishops renew the members in the company’s service annually, they could presumably dissolve the company by refusing to admit new members.... Each time the one of the company’s activities raises public question or controversy ... the bishops find themselves assailed with the same questions: Are these people part of the church, or are they not, and if they are what controls does the church have over them?" 
  6. ^ Anglican diocese of Edmonton webpage, accessed 07 Sept 2007
  7. ^ St. John's School of Alberta Handbook 2007-2008, available through a link to http://www.sjsa.ab.ca/renweb.php on the school's website, accessed 07 Sept 2007.
  8. ^ St. John' School of Alberta, child welfare investigation, 19 Jan 1990. (2008, May 2). In Wikisource, The Free Library. Retrieved 17:25, May 2, 2008, from http://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=St._John%27_School_of_Alberta%2C_child_welfare_investigation%2C_19_Jan_1990&oldid=631817
  9. ^ FG Vaughn Marshall websbite, accessed 14 Aug 2007
  10. ^ Calgary Herald newspaper story 08 Feb 2003
  11. ^ Calgary Herald newspaper article 08 Feb 2003
  12. ^ CBC television report 12 Oct 2000 re conviction of former SJCBS teacher and assistant headmaster, Kenneth Mackinnon Mealey, accessed 14 Aug 2007