Race and politics, starring the Vancouver School Board.

Despite the teachers’ strike, tonight at the school board building on Broadway, the board may vote on a motion inspired by Bill Chu, head of the Canadians for Reconciliation Society, and tabled by COPE trustee Allan Wong.

According to Wong’s motion, the province must “incorporate the history of British Columbians of Chinese descent and of the Indigenous People into the learning objectives of B.C. school curriculum” and recognize “the adverse effects of B.C.’s policies on their respective communities.” Only then, is “reconciliation” possible.

Reconciliation? The Chinese diaspora long ago reconciled across Vancouver, helping comprise our city’s middle and upper class. Asian kids jack-up the IQ of Vancouver’s student body. They thrive, some say dominate, at many colleges and universities and help fuel industry of all kinds.

Before continuing, a brief aside.

Did you catch it? Wong slipped “Indigenous People” into his motion about Chinese content in the curriculum. Why would he do that?

Because that’s the best way to propose anything at the Vancouver School Board. Make it, somehow, about First Nations and the vote will be unanimous. Aboriginal graduation rates wallow at 32 per cent compared to 82 per cent overall. The board’s “program for every problem” mentality, which ignores the crucial role parents and families play in student success, drives the district’s myriad aboriginal programs and an upcoming aboriginal-only school. From an early age, Vancouver students learn about aboriginal people and the misdeeds of European settlers. Two high school courses are dedicated to the aboriginal experience. So forget about the “Indigenous” element of Wong’s motion. That’s a canard.

Wong’s motion continues: “An understanding of the vast contributions and the injustices of the past… is vital to guide students’ action in the future. Yet, there currently is inadequate information in the B.C. curriculum” about Chinese folks in Canada.

Untrue. Students study the Chinese Head Tax, the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Canadian Pacific Railway—the holy trinity of Chinese history on the West Coast. Mandarin bilingualism started last September and will eventually include all grades.

So what’s the deal? Who, besides Bill Chu and Allan Wong, wants more Chinese content in Vancouver classrooms? And why are they doing this now?

Well-known in Chinatown and left-leaning political circles, Chu’s got connections. As an activist, he helped kill the downtown casino expansion plan and always surfaces during civic election campaigns. He’s the type of guy politicians (see Allan Wong) want to know. Chu’s beat the Chinese “victim” drum for years.

But in 2010, in a Georgia Straight op/ed, David Wong, director of the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of B.C., blasted Chu, calling his indictment of school curriculum “pure BS.” According to David Wong, “high school history books contained many references to the historic head tax and past racist injustices.”

Last week, as a steady rain fell on Granville Street, I talked with several Chinese-Canadians including Michelle Liang who spent five years in Vancouver public schools. Now a 27-year-old accountant, Liang furrowed her brow at the school board motion. “I don’t necessarily agree with that. Growing up, I never felt like the history of Chinese people, or immigrants or whatever, was ignored. I just didn’t.”

Outside a Starbucks, Kathy Xie, a middle-aged mother from Richmond, agreed with Liang, but… “I do think it’s important to know about things like the railroad because that was really bad.”

Really bad? Really?

In the 1880s, faced with a labour shortage, the Canadian Pacific Railway tapped Chinese contractors who shipped thousands of eager workers from China to complete a relatively small section of the 22,500-kilometre railway while white workers, mainly, laid the rest of the track. It was tough work. They lived in tents. Some died on the job. There was no WCB in the 1800s. And while Chinese railway workers made less money than their non-Chinese counterparts, most eventually quit the railway, opting for the higher pay and greater opportunity of B.C.’s goldfields where they prospered.

In 1885 the federal government passed the Chinese Immigration Act, with its $50 “head tax” for Chinese immigrants only. Today, Canadians gasp at such measures. But between 1995 and 2005, immigrants from China and elsewhere paid $975 for entry into Canada. In 2006, the fee was reduced to $490.

Was there institutional “racism” in Canada in the 1800s? Of course. But by today’s standards, the world was racist. Chinese immigrants settled across Canada, and through hard work and determination, lived free from poverty, famine and dynastic rule. In successive generations, they’ve flourished. It’s an immigration success story spurred not by Bill Chu’s victimization ideology but by the virtues of a great people.

Which makes Wong’s school board motion, and its architect, irrelevant. But if they’re searching for declarations, how about an official note of gratitude to the country they call home.

mhasiuk@vancourier.com

Twitter: @MarkHasiuk