Through their participation in social studies, students are encouraged to

• understand and prepare to exercise their roles, rights, and responsibilities within Canada and the world
• develop an appreciation of democracy and what it means to be Canadian
• demonstrate respect for human equality and cultural diversity
• think critically, evaluate information, and practise effective communication.

Social Studies 11 contributes to the important goal of preparing students for their lives as Canadian citizens and members of the international community. By learning about and discussing issues related to government, history, and human geography, students will appreciate how these subjects are necessarily interrelated when addressing local and global social challenges.

With a fuller understanding of Canadian society in particular, and global affairs in general, students are better equipped to see for themselves, move beyond conventional pieties, and resist the twin horsemen of the modern apocalypse: ignorance and apathy.

The following quote by economist Jeffrey Sachs, from The End of Poverty, highlights some crucial issues, illustrating the importance of social studies education.

Terrorism is not the only threat that the world faces.  It would be a huge mistake to direct all our energies, efforts, resources, and lives to the fight against terrorism while leaving vast and even greater challenges aside. Almost three thousand people died needlessly and tragically at the World Trade Center on September 11; ten thousand Africans die needlessly and tragically every single day—and have died every single day since September 11—of AIDS, TB, and malaria.  We need to keep September 11 in perspective, especially because the ten thousand daily deaths are preventable.…To fight terrorism, we will need to fight poverty and deprivation as well.…All of the incessant debate about development assistance, and whether the rich are doing enough to help the poor, actually concerns less than 1 percent of rich-world income.  The effort required of the rich is indeed so slight that to do less is to announce brazenly to a large part of the world, “You count for nothing.”  We should not be surprised, then, if in later years the rich reap the whirlwind of that heartless response.

The hope of social studies is a continuation of the progress in political democratization to a realization of economic democratization, requiring a new paradigm to replace our current unjust and dysfunctional system. The vision of environmental scientist Donella Meadows, from Beyond the Limits, expresses this social progress.

People don’t need enormous cars; they need respect.  They don’t need closets full of clothes; they need to feel attractive and they need excitement and variety and beauty.  People don’t need electronic entertainment; they need something worthwhile to do with their lives.  People need identity, community, challenge, acknowledgement, love, joy.   To try to fill these needs with material things is to set up an unquenchable appetite for false solutions to real and never-satisfied problems.  The resulting psychological emptiness is one of the major forces behind the desire for material growth.

Social Studies 11 aims to nurture the vision of learners, and empower them to enact their ideas for a better society because, as Montesquieu wrote in 1748,

“The tyranny of a prince in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy.”

Matthew Webster no longer teaches at CSS, but will try to maintain this website for as long as it remains online.