Conference calls on educators to push for change
- Andréa Ledding | March 21, 2016
The third annual Think Indigenous conference covered a lot of ground March 15th to 18th, inspiring educators with talks, workshops, banquets, and tours, including keynote speakers Cindy Blackstock and Neal McLeod on Friday.
“Kids understand equality, they understand love, and they understand fairness. Kids are not just learners they’re teachers,” noted Blackstock. “It’s a very young age when they start to believe they’re not worth the money.”
Yet they are our hope and our future; they are more important than we are, she added.
“Nobody else has to fight from childhood to be treated equally by the government of Canada,” said Blackstock. “Kids codify that as about them. When they don’t see all of us standing up against it, it makes it that much harder.”
She showed documents from her recent court case win, and explained that governments don’t create change, they respond to change, and it is incumbent upon us to call for that change.
“It’s just as vital to teach non-Aboriginal kids about this as it is the First Nations, Métis, and Inuit kids,” noted Blackstock, giving examples of the children activists who have supported her or started their own initiatives.
Thursday was a powerhouse of Indigenous speakers.
“We all have to ask ourselves where did I come from, what’s my story? If you don’t know where you came from there’s no way you’re going to know where you’re going,” noted Chief Delbert Wapass speaking on the Treaty right to Education. “Treaty is not about you it’s about those kids who are not yet born. What is your responsibility?”
He described teachers as oskapios (helpers) — with a sacred, not a corporate, responsibility to treaty, being who we are. “What is the spirit and intent? A lot of us as Indian people fail the spiritual part of our treaties...why did they negotiate treaties, what does that mean, a covenant? Why did they use prayer, the pipe, why do we still exist, why does our treaty right to education still exist today and what does that mean?”
He described Indigenous people as being like ants once you’ve really studied a colony — because each ant has a role and is needed. They are resilient and will rebuild. They take care of each other as a collective.
“Our education system wasn’t built around money. It was built around ideas, it was built around values.
“Treaty is about controlling our own destiny, not being dependent on government,” noted Wapass. “Decolonize your thinking.
“Treaty wasn’t negotiated overnight. Prayer was put into it. So I challenge every one of you to define what treaty means, to define yourselves as an educator...if we want to continue existing, we have to connect to our children.”
Dr. Shauneen Pete noted how every learner in the country has been disadvantaged by not learning about Indigenous communities, and responsibilities are not only to Indigenous students but non-Indigenous students to fix that.
Kathleen Bird encouraged teachers to learn alongside their students by going on regular medicine walks and beginning to learn how to identify basic plants and medicines. “We come from a beautiful place. We had everything...we were never a people to sit in a box and learn in a box, the world was our teacher.”
Jeremy Thompson of Saskatchewan Rush talked about the traditional and ceremonial healing aspects of lacrosse, and how it saved his own life when he was a challenged teen. His community holds a medicine game of lacrosse every spring, dedicated to healing those who most need it.
“Win or lose, what you can ask yourself is, what was my effort level out there...it’s about who I’m playing it for.”
Curtis Jo Miller came from a life of abuse and crime to become an artist and youth worker, and he advocates giving responsibility to young people who are having hard times in school.
Sharon Venne discussed how the treaty never meant the surrender of lands because women, who are the land-owners, never touched the treaty. She urged people to educate themselves with Elders’ teachings and traditional ways so that when we make our report to Creator, we can answer the three questions we will all be asked.
Norman Fleury ended the Thursday talks with reflections on the Métis perspective, noting of all Indigenous people, “Our language and our culture and our spirituality and the land is the glue that makes us who we are and holds us together.”
Educators from across the province took part, and the talks were also livestreamed and will be uploaded on USask’s Youtube channel for everyone to enjoy and learn from.