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Well, thank you for watching this video on aligned programming. I want to start the video with a question: what do Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and aligned programming all have in common? Well, the answer is they don’t exist, none of them exists. The aligned programming doesn’t exist within Alberta Education’s program of studies. Now, you’ll hear the term “program aligned programming” or “our program is aligned to Alberta Ed.” Often the term “align” has been around for a long time. Unfortunately, people think, even school administrators think, that that aligned programming is an actual program offered by Alberta Education. It’s not. It has been used to describe various programs there, but because there’s no formal program within the program studies here in Alberta for aligned programming, the term “aligned” can mean various things and it can be used in various ways across the province and various home ed or homeschooling programs. There’s a lot more I can say about it, but it’s so prevalent that I wanted to make a video to let you know that just like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, aligned programming is a tradition but it doesn’t exist. There’s no such thing as aligned programming in Alberta Education’s program of studies. If someone tells you that your student is an aligned student, they’re not giving you facts. There’s no such thing as an aligned student like there is for a home education student (Code 600), a shared responsibility student (Code 610), or an online learning student (Code 620). There’s no aligned programming code because there’s no aligned program. There’s nothing in the program studies called aligned programming.

Now, people can say, “school administrators can say, ‘well we have an aligned program’.” What does that mean? Well, what it means is that they’ve taken a teacher-directed program and “aligned” the outcomes from Alberta Ed to a non-Alberta Ed resource. Now, I’m saying this as a description of a typical “aligned” program because there’s no aligned program officially defined or offered in the program of studies. You might find in an aligned program that is operated differently, so the most common, the most common aligned program is one that takes Alberta Education outcomes and aligns those outcomes to non-Alberta Ed outcomes from a resource. Let’s say, for example, Saxon Math Algebra 1 or Teaching Textbooks or Math U See or any host of non-Alberta Education resources like Saxon Rights. Those all those resources are based from the United, on the United States program studies in their curriculum. So what these aligned programs have done is mixed Alberta Ed with essentially home education. You’ll find in the descriptions of an aligned program many, many terms that are borrowed from home education to describe an aligned program because the program, the schools that are trying to promote this aligned program want the parent to see an aligned program as a “home education-ish” program. That’s not really what’s going on. We can talk, I’d be more than happy to talk more about this issue, which I believe is a problem, because parents are being led to believe these schools are intentionally describing this aligned program as if it’s a formal, official program offered by Alberta, and it’s not. And these school officials are intentionally trying to describe this alleged aligned program as if it’s a type of home education program. It’s not. It’s a, “aligned” is a problem. I, at least personally speaking, it’s a problem. It’s misrepresenting what’s really going on, and if that was the end of it, that’s one thing, but that’s not the end of it.

I hear from many, many parents who have either left V to join an aligned program because oftentimes there are more fun, more benefits, more financial benefits associated with an aligned program. So you have to ask the question, “where is this extra funding coming from?” It’s a famous line that says “follow the money,” and you’ll find where the problem is. But if it were just a financial issue, you know, maybe that’s whatever, that’s just kind of how things are. But the problem is home education parents are being, I believe, intentionally led astray from home education. I’ll use that term, and then they come back to V and they think, “wow, I’ll never do that again,” because of all the added responsibilities that a parent has in an aligned program. Because the parent becomes the teacher, in exchange for this extra funding there are many other, usually many hoops to jump through, many extra responsibilities that the parent is taking on to provide examples and samples of work to the “facilitator.” Again, a home ed term that’s used, and these parents are like, “wow, that was so restricted. There was no freedom for the parent to choose this or that. It just was not what the parent thought the program was going to be.” So they’ve come back to our program and then they’ve told me of these experiences. So the problem is that it’s not home ed. It’s affecting home ed parents who want home education and yet that’s not what they’re getting with an aligned program. So it’s harming home education. It’s, yeah, it’s just a problem.

So if you’re interested in an aligned program and you’re watching this video and you’re thinking, “wow, that’s, I haven’t heard this before,” please contact me. My information will be below on this video, and I’ll be more than happy to walk you through some finer details and ask you about what you’ve heard from the program that’s offering this alleged aligned programming, and I’ll be able to pick out those pieces that you’re describing to me and identify where the school side is coming in but you’re thinking it’s home education. So lots to be said. So contact me if you have questions, but again, in summary, please know there is no such thing as an aligned program within Alberta Ed. If you really want to take it further, ask the school administrator who’s telling you about this aligned program, ask them what, what program code is aligned programming? They’ll say, “well,” they won’t tell you usually. And if you say, “well, there is no, I’ve heard,” you could say, “I’ve heard there’s no such thing as a line programming in the program of studies, so how are you, the school administrator, how are you coding my child? Are you coding my child as an online learning student? Are you coding my child as a home ed student?” Ask those questions. You’ll, you’ll find, you’ll get some interesting answers or perhaps non-answers. So again, there’s a much more I can say on that, so if you’d like to talk more about it, please contact me. But I want you to be knowledgeable and empowered with this information that there is no such thing as an aligned program.