EDUCATION SHOULD BE FOCUS ON SEPT. 30, SAY ADVOCATES

FLAMBOROUGH AND CANADA - TO MARK SECOND NATIONAL DAY FOR TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION

As the second National Day for Truth and Reconciliation is marked Sept. 30, local Indigenous stakeholders and allies say education should be the top priority.

Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation Chief R. Stacey Laforme said he is hoping the day is one of reflection, understanding and educating.

"I'm constantly talking to people about these issues and topics," he said. "So when I hear from other reports and see other papers and they say 35 per cent of Canadians have no idea about residential schools, I'm absolutely flabbergasted about how that can possibly be.

"We've done a lot of work — Indigenous people across the land and our allies — but obviously there is so much more we still have to do."

Waterdown District High School teacher, author and historian Nathan Tidridge, who has written books about the relationship between Indigenous peoples and the Crown, agreed education should be a focus.

"That's the critical piece that has to be tied to it so that people understand why the day needs to be marked and needs to be commemorated and what work needs to be done in order to fulfil that," he said. "There's still a lot of work that needs to be done."

Tidridge noted residential schools were part of a larger system of forced assimilation and genocide that includes the Indian Act.

"They didn't just appear. They were constructed and designed for a purpose — and they were quite effective," he said.

Education, said Tidridge, starts in the classroom, but he thinks it is incumbent upon Canadians of all ages to educate themselves on residential schools and Indigenous relations.

"In this day and age, it's not really acceptable for someone to say, 'I don't understand it,' or 'I don't know what happened,'" he said. "It definitely involves the schools and the schools are doing work toward that, but it's incumbent upon the general public to learn about this and there are all kinds of ways to access that information."

Tidridge said there is a danger that the day turns into people wearing an orange shirt, just because that's what you're supposed to do on Sept. 30 — and that's it.

Meanwhile, Audrey Davis, the executive director of the Hamilton Regional Indian Centre, said the organization is holding a three-day long celebration

of being Indigenous, with a focus on Indigenous children and families.

"Really highlighting how good our people are doing despite the fact that we're having this event because of the trauma caused by the Canadian system."

She said it is important Canadians do not forget the children who were murdered by the residential school system and truly educate themselves on the history of relations between Canada and Indigenous peoples.

"I would like to see the non-Indigenous community working to inform themselves and inform the nonIndigenous people about

the actual true history," she said "Racism and discrimination has always been an issue due to the concerted efforts of the powers that be and the various systems that enforced the propaganda around Indigenous people and causing the situation today.

"Including those acts of genocide and cultural genocide that are still ongoing issues within the system."

Laforme said the education aspect is certainly important work and he thinks it will be a team effort from Indigenous groups and allies to help tell the stories and help people understand.

When talking about the topic, he stresses that children who were killed at residential schools aren't just Indigenous children, but Canadian children.

"These are your children, these are our children," he said. "That understanding is the only way we're going to keep the history alive so we don't make mistakes like that in the future."

Laforme said while it is vital that the non-Indigenous community mark the day, adding it doesn't have to be elaborate.

"You can go in your backyard and plant flowers in a circle, make them orange flowers if you want —

you can do something like that and then you can teach your children what it's all about," he said. "It doesn't have to be a huge grandiose thing, it can be a small, personal thing — as long as it lasts and happens again."

Laforme said he would encourage people to listen to his poem '215: Reconciliation,' which ends with a strong message — but one he stresses is not to say reconciliation cannot happen, just that Canada is still at the beginning of the journey.

The poem ends:

"And when I am asked, What does reconciliation mean to me?

I will say I want their lives back.

I want them to live, to soar.

I want to hear their laughter.

See their smiles.

Give me that.

And I'll grant you reconciliation."

STORY BEHIND THE STORY: As we approach the second National Day for Truth and Reconciliation on Sept. 30, the Review reached out to local Indigenous stakeholders and allies to see how they think the day should be marked.