Community News

TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION DAY A TIME FOR EDUCATION

SEPT. 30 ORANGE SHIRT DAY TO REMEMBER VICTIMS OF RESIDENTIAL SCHOOLS

MARK NEWMAN mnewman@ hamiltonnews.com

For Amanda Aitchison, it's about educating and remembering.

The Indigenous awareness programmer at Mohawk College and her associates were busy Sept. 19 handing out information at the Fennell Campus about National Day for Truth and Reconciliation Orange Shirt Day on Sept. 30.

"A lot of students we talked to don't know anything about it, so it's a great opportunity to bring attention and share those messages with students," Aitchison said.

Canada's National Day for Truth and Reconciliation is observed each Sept. 30 to honour the children who never came home from residential schools along with residential school survivors, their families and communities.

"It's a great start for people to wear orange in honour of those residential school survivors and the legacy they left behind," said Aitchison, who has family ties to the Cayugas of the Six Nations of the Grand River.

She said her grandparents were taken to residential schools.

Aitchison noted it's important to keep the education and conversations going after Orange Shirt Day.

"It's taking an interest in what that day represents who we are as a people and also looking at those 94 calls to action (from the national Truth and Reconciliation Commission) and what you're going to do to be a part of the solution," Aitchison said. "It's important to acknowledge those hard truths so we can see where we went wrong and how we can fix that; how we can decolonize and indigenize the institutions that we are a part of."

Michelle Rivers, an Anishinaabe/Ojibwe student who is enrolled in Mohawk's Indigenous Studies program and has plans to seek a degree in Indigenous Studies at McMaster University, said the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation means a great deal to her.

"Finally, there is some validation because my mother and my aunt, who are all Ojibwe, were taken away from their parents, my grandparents in 1951, never to live with them again, separated and forced into assimilation,"

said Rivers. Rivers added she had a brother she never met who was taken in the infamous Sixties Scoop when Indigenous children were removed from their

families without their consent and placed into the child welfare system.

"If somebody can take one little piece away from Truth and Reconciliation

Day, that's some help," Rivers added.

Amanda White, manager of Indigenous student services at Mohawk and member of the Ojibwe

First Nation, said it's about remembering and honouring residential school survivors and the children who never returned home.

"It's an important day to recognize, remember and keep the conversations going about the history and the realities that have happened," White said.

A delegation of four Mohawk Indigenous students and two staffers are headed for the World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education in Adelaide, Australia Sept. 26-30.

"These students will have the opportunity to get some professional development, to present on an international level and also earn a college credit," White said.

National Day for Truth and Reconciliation activities at Mohawk includes a screening of a documentary on the recent building of a birch bark canoe by Indigenous students at the Fennell campus. See mohawkcollege.ca and click on the Indigenous student link at the bottom of the page for more information on services available for Indigenous students at Mohawk College.

STORY BEHIND THE STORY: With the arrival of National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, we wanted to find out how it was being commemorated at Mohawk College.

TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION

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2022-09-29T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-09-29T07:00:00.0000000Z

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