NWT residential school survivors provide feedback on national centre
Yellowknife among 16 locations across Canada where residents talk about how much information from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission should be made public
James Goldie
Northern News Services
Monday, November 2, 2015
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Although it has been almost six months since the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission released its findings, the group's work is far from over.
On Oct. 27, the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation - which is based at the University of Manitoba - hosted a community engagements session in Yellowknife, inviting residential school survivors, their descendants and members of the public to come together to provide feedback on what the centre should do with all the information collected by the commission since it was first formed in 2008.
Doreen Reid, whose parents attended residential school in Saskatchewan and she herself was forced to attend a day school herself, said she came to the event because she wanted to learn more about what the future process would be for the centre.
"I think (these events) are really important," she said. "I think if they are going to share our stories, if they are going to collect and archive and maintain our information, I think it's important for them to seek our thoughts and opinions on how we want that information preserved."
More than 30 people attended the all-day event, which included an overview of the centre followed by a series of group discussions and presentations.
Organizers asked participants what information they would like to see made available from the more than five million documents collected by the commission made available, and of that information whether or not they should conceal names of people mentioned in the documents. Similarly, they wanted to know if the information should be available for educational and research purposes, or should it only be available to families.
"This information doesn't belong to the centre," said Charlene Bearhead, education at the centre.
She said she was very pleased to hear from people in Yellowknife that it is important to make records available so survivors and non-indigenous people can learn the truth about the residential school system.
"There have been indications that other communities want us to come to them and visit as many communities as possible, to get the most opinions," said Bearhead.
Yellowknife is the tenth out of 16 communities across Canada where these engagement sessions are being held, including Whitehorse, Iqaluit and Kuujjuaq.
"The biggest challenge is there's a limited budget to be able to travel to communities," she said. "There needs to be an opportunity to go to every community so that survivors aren't expected to come out somewhere."
The centre's online database will be launched on Nov. 4, which will allow people to search for information on every residential school in Canada by province or region. Until the community consultations are complete, only information that is already in the public domain will be available through the centre's database.
"I think it's going to be interesting to see how this national centre presents the information, how accessible it will be," said Reid.
"I think it's an exciting time and one more part in the whole process of truth and reconciliation."
