Best practices

The best practices chosen by the Commissioner were selected because they were developed in partnership with the Franco-Ontarian community, or because they enhanced the vitality of disadvantaged Francophone populations in some concrete way.

Ontario and Quebec sign a statement on the Canadian Francophonie

In 2014-2015, Ontario and Quebec agreed to resume joint cabinet meetings to discuss issues of importance to central Canada and to further develop their cooperative relationship. The four joint meeting of the Cabinet Ministers of both provinces took place on November 21, 2014, in Toronto. In the context of this meeting, the Office of Francophone Affairs worked closely with the Secrétariat aux affaires intergouvernementales canadiennes du Québec to produce the Statement on Canadian Francophonie.³⁰ Through this statement, Ontario and Quebec made a commitment to work closely together on the Canadian Francophonie, notably by:

• seizing the opportunity of the celebrations of 400 years of French presence in Ontario and the various events leading up to the 150th anniversary of Confederation;
• asking the federal government to act quickly on Francophone immigration;
• urging the federal government to support Radio.Canada in fulfilling its mandate;
• promoting exchanges between young Ontarian Francophones and those attending French immersion classes and young Québécois; and
• encouraging the active offer of services in French in order to enlarge the espace francophone in Canada.

Early integration of French-language services of the Ministry of Children and Youth Services

The Child Protection Information Network is a new single – case management system for child welfare that replaces six different types of case management systems and standardizes business processes. The goals of the new system are to enhance child safety, improve Children’s Aid Society (CAS) management and ministry oversight through the provision of more timely, accurate, and comparable data, and reduce the adjudicative burden on CASs.

The language in the application was also reviewed to ensure that the proper Ontario child welfare terminology was reflected in both languages. Users are able to toggle between English and French screens. Training materials, including curriculum and computer simulations, will also be available in French where required.

Union des cultivateurs franco-ontariens (UCFO) service delivery improvement

Ministry staff from the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs has worked with Agricorp and the UCFO to determine the best way to help the UCFO identify Francophone farmers to improve the UCFO’s ability to offer its services to them. As a result, information about the UCFO and its services was included in the Farm Business Registration (FBR) renewal package sent annually by Agricorp. The Ministry has also begun to provide the UCFO with the business contact information of the Francophone customers in the FBR database. Agricorp is continuing to explore how else it can help the UCFO meet its objective.

Ministry of Transportation’s Bilingual Strategy for Variable Message Signs

On January 20, 2015, the Minister of Transportation announced a strategy for the province-wide deployment of bilingual variable message signs (VMSs) in areas designated under the French Language Services Act. Why was the Ministry not able to add French characters to these signs years ago? It seems rather simple, but in reality involved many years of work on the part of Ministry staff and consultants who worked diligently to roll out the strategy.

The multitude of stages throughout the project from 2004 to 2015 led to the completion of modifications to the central sign control software, produced a final report, secured the approval of the pictogram library, federal-provincial funding for the education campaign, a VMS policy and publicity of the study across government transportation and transit agencies, consulting firms, industry vendors and software developers.

Best practices from around the world with regional research and public input have helped the ministry create signs designed for Ontario drivers. This is the first bilingual image-based signage plan developed and executed province-wide in Canada.

Knowledge Exchange and Networking Sessions

In the fall of 2014, the Ontario Women’s Directorate met its Sexual Violence Action Plan commitment to convene a series of community sessions with local service providers to build relationships and strengthen collaboration. The Directorate held knowledge exchange and networking sessions on collaborating to respond to sexual violence in Toronto, Timmins, Thunder Bay and Orleans. The sessions brought together service providers and other professionals from across sectors to network, exchange information on innovative programs and initiatives, and explore opportunities to develop more collaborative and inclusive approaches to prevent and respond to sexual violence.

In discussions with local partners, the Directorate assessed how to accommodate service providers’ participation in the sessions, which included evaluating how to best integrate both French and English into the sessions, such as with bilingual facilitators, presenters, meeting materials, as well as consecutive and simultaneous interpretation. This resulted in a high degree of appreciation from session attendees, who were able to participate in the official language of their choice during the panels, the breakout discussions and the report-back sessions.

Élargir l’espace francophone – The Mining Essentials program

In the summer of 2014, Collège Boréal delivered a 12-week training session to First Nation, Métis and Inuit students from Northern Ontario French-language secondary schools as well as potential college and university students. Some were seeking to move on to the labour market immediately after completing their secondary school studies while others sought to pursue postsecondary education. The Mining Essentials program was delivered in French for the first time in Canada. The collaboration was initiated by Élargir l’espace francophone, resulting in partnership with the Destination réussite – Volet 1 Steering Committee for the Northern Region, the Métis Nation of Ontario and the Mining Industry Human Resources Council.

The Mining Essentials program is designed to teach skills through hands-on experiences, tools, documents and authentic situations specific to the industry, while focusing on Aboriginal cultures and traditions. It combines two approaches to enhance the learning experience:

• classroom training on basic skills and non-technical preparatory work deemed necessary by the industry to get an entry-level job; and
• activities aimed at discovering the industry, including site visits, practical exercises, conferences and professional recognition, as defined by the educational institution providing the training and its partners.

30. Available online: http://news.ontario.ca/opo/en/2014/11/statement-on-canadian-francophonie.html (page consulted in May 2015).