OISE Press, 1980. ISBN: 0-7744-0197-4. Based on Galloway's University of Toronto Ph. D. dissertation. Out of print, but can be found in some libraries.

Priscilla Galloway points an accusing finger at bias in English literature courses in secondary schools. Her examination of forty-two senior courses in eight Ontario schools reveals that the literary diet being offered to students is inappropriate for Canadian life and times. Galloway also suggests how, in a country seeking to establish its national identity, to be fair-minded, and to have a contemporary approach, these goals can be reflected in English curriculum materials.

Galloway writes, "I have a fantasy. Sometimes I dream of offering a compulsory English course with works written entirely by women, featuring mostly female main characters. The course might include one novel and a couple of short stories featuring a male, most or all of them written by women. In my scenario, these features of the course would not go unnoticed. There would be objections, predictably, from male students and likely from young women as well. There would be rebellion in the ranks of teachers, partly because much of the material would inevitably be unfamiliar to them. Outcries from parents, uproar in the media, would doubtless ensue. The course, no matter what its balance of past and present works and of literature by Canadians, no matter how excellent the writing and language study component might be, no matter how wide ranging the teaching methods and evaluation criteria, would be attacked as narrow in focus and lacking essential balance.

I speculate that it would be shot down by the school in which it was proposed, the Board of Education, and the provincial Ministry of Education, notwithstanding that it meets every criterion now established for course design.

But what a glorious consciousness-raising device! Is there any other way really to get people to see the fact that the opposite situation is now the norm?"

Dr. Galloway is an English consultant and university lecturer who has been active in professional associations and central curriculum development work for many years. As an appendix to her book she provides a course that could do much to correct the defects her research has brought to light.

What's Wrong with High School English? Is strong medicine, but it will be of real help to those planners and teachers of English literature who want their courses to be meaningful to students.