In 1944, Olivette Pagé started grade 1 at S.S. #16 in Clarence Township, within the United Counties of Prescott and Russell in Eastern Ontario. She would continue in the one-room, rural schoolhouse through to grade 8. Like many Catholic schools in French communities in Ontario at the time, S.S. #16 was considered a bilingual school. While instruction in grades 1 and 2 was in French, education in grade 3 and beyond was largely in English. Olivette recalls that math was taught in English and that students were required to learn English reading and spelling in addition to French reading and spelling. School inspectors visited the school regularly, at least monthly, to test students in math, English and French, and they—not the school teachers—determined whether students progressed to the next grade based on their performance on standardized tests.

The nature of the education of French Catholic children in Ontario in the 1940s was a product of political events that had occurred many decades earlier. The right to education in separate Catholic schools had been guaranteed in the Scott Act, 1863 and reinforced in the Constitution Act, 1867 (originally known as the British North America Act).

By 1883, about 30,000 pupils attended Roman Catholic separate schools in Ontario, according to The Schools of Ontario, 1876-1976, an in-depth study commissioned by the Government of Ontario as part of the Ontario Historical Studies Series. The study's author, Robert M. Stamp, notes that "Although subject to the same central authority as the public schools, the separate schools of Ontario were influenced strongly by the province's Roman Catholic hierarchy and local clergy." The Liberal government under Premier Oliver Mowat tried to strike a balance between the desire of some Catholic leaders to have even greater control of separate schools and the demands of some Protestant leaders to abolish separate schools altogether. "The Mowat administration began by accepting the constitutional reality of separate schools, and sought to improve rather than abolish them."

As the province's French-speaking population rose, so too did the number of schools. "By 1883 there were twenty-seven schools, largely concentrated in Prescott and Russell counties, which were exclusively French, plus uncounted others scattered across the province which were predominantly French." Educators were concerned that French students had an inadequate grasp of the English language, with one school inspector noting that "The English subjects are the weakest and require special drill."

Protestant opposition to separate schools, particularly French Catholic schools, became an important issue in the 1886 election in Ontario. Stamp writes: "Roman Catholics and their separate schools were harmful enough in the eyes of the Toronto Mail and its Anglo-Protestant readers, but French-speaking Ontarians and their bilingual schools were viewed as an even greater threat to the cultural solidarity of the province and the nation.... Not only had these schools become 'nurseries ... of an alien tongue,' charged the Mail, but also 'of alien customs, of alien sentiments, and ... of a wholly alien people.'" The principal of one English school argued that teaching exclusively in French was "a barrier to the progress of the Anglo-Saxon civilization in the Province of Ontario."

Though the governing Liberals returned to power after the 1886 election, tensions over the French and bilingual schools issue continued to grow. "Anxious to defuse such political dynamite," writes Stamp, "Premier Mowat in May 1889 named Professor A.H. Reynar of Victoria University to head a three-man commission to investigate the enforcement of English-language regulations in both French and German bilingual schools. The commissioners had nothing but praise for the German-English schools of Waterloo County, but they discovered that more than half of the French-English schools in Prescott and Russell failed to devote the prescribed amount of time to English." Moreover, "the commissioners found that of sixty-nine teachers employed, only three had ever attended high school, and only two had attended model schools and thus qualified for provincial certification. They also discovered the widespread use of unauthorized, French-language textbooks from Quebec, and a heavy Roman Catholic clerical influence in these supposedly public schools." To remedy the situation, Reynar and his colleagues recommended more effective bilingual training schools, more rigid requirements for teacher certification, and the use of authorized bilingual texts. The Liberal government acted on the commission's recommendations for closer adherence to departmental regulations while continuing to resist calls for the abolition of separate schools. "When the same commissioners once again toured Prescott and Russell counties in 1893," writes Stamp, "they found that their recommendations were slowly being put into practice—the time given to instruction in English had increased in the majority of schools."

The early 1900s saw a continued influx of francophones into Ontario, particularly in Eastern Ontario. According to Why Ontario once tried to ban French in schools, within the first few decades of the 20th century, "the francophone population had doubled from five to roughly 10 per cent of the provincial makeup." And with the increased numbers of francophones came increased demands for services in French. The Canadian Encyclopedia's article Ontario Schools Question notes that "In 1910, the growing number of Franco-Ontarians organized the Association canadienne-française d’éducation de l’Ontario (ACFÉO) to protect and promote the French language." Opposition continued from Protestants via the Orange Order and Irish Catholics, led by Bishop Michael Francis Fallon of London, Ontario.

Against the backdrop of tensions between English and French Ontarians and Anglophone and Francophone Catholics, in 1910, Conservative Premier James Whitney commissioned Francis Walter Merchant to conduct a thorough investigation of the province's English-French schools. The Canadian Encyclopedia's article Ontario Schools Question states: "A commission headed by Francis Walter Merchant, the province's chief school inspector, concluded that the quality of education and of English instruction in bilingual schools was inadequate. The commission recommended better teacher training and the flexible introduction of English as the main language of instruction."

However, bowing to political pressure, Whitney's Conservative government took a different approach. In 1912, just two months after Merchant had delivered his commission's report, the Ontario government issued Regulation 17, which limited French instruction to the first two years of elementary schooling. An amendment in 1913 permitted French as a subject of study for one hour per day.

French Catholics in the province vigorously opposed the new regulation. According to Why Ontario once tried to ban French in schools, "To thwart government efforts to enforce the regulation, parents would sometimes tell their children to leave their classrooms if the school inspector came, making it difficult for the inspector to judge whether French was still being taught in classrooms." Opposition was particularly strong in Ottawa. "The most famous confrontation was the 'Battle of the Hatpins.' On January 29, 1916, francophone mothers outside an Ottawa elementary school prevented inspectors from entering by brandishing their long hatpins as weapons."

Stamp provides additional colour to the resistance: "Throughout the 1910s and early 1920s a large number of supposedly bilingual schools—particularly in the rural parts of Prescott and Russell counties—openly defied Regulation 17 and functioned primarily as French-instruction schools." One inspector reported in the fall of 1922 that "he had been denied entrance to twenty-nine of forty-five schools" and that he feared the other schools on his list would refuse him as well. The conclusion was that "instead of introducing youngsters to the English language, Regulation 17 had led to a stubborn defence of the mother tongue and a continued inferior level of schooling for many Franco-Ontarians."

The Canadian Encyclopedia's article Ontario Schools Question states that "Unable to enforce Regulation 17 despite being one of its leading proponents, [Conservative] Premier Howard Ferguson scrapped it in 1927 and introduced a new policy promoting improved bilingual instruction," according to . French was given legal status in schools, and the University of Ottawa Normal School (a teachers’ college) was officially recognized."

Nevertheless, Why Ontario once tried to ban French in schools argues that "Franco-Ontarian citizens were still made to feel like second-class citizens well after Regulation 17’s withdrawal. Full public funding wasn’t offered to French-language secondary schools until 1968, meaning parents who wanted their children to complete their education in French had to pay out of pocket for the privilege."

Despite the failure of Regulation 17 (or perhaps because of it), English instruction continued to be an important element of education in bilingual schools, including S.S. #16 Clarence (Prescott-Russell), where Olivette began in 1944, the same year that Regulation 17 fell into abeyance.

However, rather than see the requirement to learn English as an imposition, Olivette says "we were happy about having to learn English in grade 3 because we wanted to learn the language. Every time we had a chance to speak the language, we did."

After completing her education at S.S. #16 Clarence (an education not dissimilar to the French immersion some of her grandchildren would pursue many decades later), she moved from Clarence Creek to Ottawa, where knowing both English and French was an asset. Indeed, by the age of 18, Olivette was a bilingual long-distance operator working for Bell Canada.

A Historical Overview of Education in Canada notes that "It was not until the late 1960s that legislation was passed to permit instruction in French at the elementary and secondary levels." Had Olivette been born a generation later, she might have gone to a French school rather than a bilingual one.

On its webpage Ontario’s Quiet Revolution, Heritage Matters states: "The passing of French language school legislation in 1969 was accompanied by a growing recognition of the part played in the history and life of the province by the Franco-Ontarian community." The article quotes Conservative Premier John Robarts, who acknowledged at the time that, "Men and women of French origin have played a significant role in the development of Ontario for more than three centuries … This role continues today through the FrancoOntarian community … Its strength, vitality, accomplishments and potential are immense. Ontario—indeed all of Canada—is far the richer and stronger for the presence of these French-speaking residents."