Children eligible for instruction in the minority official language: A data ecosystem

Statistics Canada is developing a data ecosystem on children eligible for instruction in English in Quebec and in French in the rest of Canada.

Main data sources for this ecosystem

1) Census of Population

• The new questions on language of instruction collect information on the number of children eligible for instruction in the minority official language, according to various characteristics of the children and household members, for different geographies, including cities and localities.
• The data will be available as of November 30, 2022.

2) 2022 Survey on the Official Language Minority Population (SOLMP)

• The SOLMP surveys the official language minority population and parents of children eligible for instruction in the minority official language to collect information on:
  • enrollment in minority official language education programs and the reasons for enrolling, or not, children in these programs;
  • parents’ intentions to enroll their child in a minority official language education program.
• The data will be available in 2024.

3) Elementary-Secondary Education Survey

• This survey collects data annually on the number of enrollments in minority official language education programs in public schools at the provincial/territorial level.
• Data have been available annually since the 1997/1998 school year.

4) Other data sources and studies will gradually be added to enrich this data ecosystem