Many Canadians seem to have lost track of the role that public education plays in the nurturing of our civic culture. We have allowed consumerist thinking--the more choice, the better--to infect public policy around education. A moment's reflection reminds us that the corollary of consumerism is fragmentation. It is important that choice in public education be conducive to the attainment of both public policy objectives and the needs of the student. In our view, public school systems should not facilitate choice that is simply a market response to consumer demand for different "packaging", elite accommodation, or any other factor irrelevant to those two primary objectives. Not all choice-based schools threaten Canadian democracy and civic values, but some do--particularly those that segregate children along lines such as race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or economic status. History teaches us that segregation promotes elitism and militates against the development of a fair-minded, inclusive democracy.