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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
For the first time ever this week, inmates at Yellowknife's North Slave Correctional Centre shared first-hand the affects of residential school on their lives - an unfortunate legacy which commissioner Marie Wilson says lives on in our public institutions.

Marie Wilson, a commissioner with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, discusses the importance of getting inmates' statements on the affects of residential schools. - Peter Worden /NNSL photo

"It lives in the emergency ward of hospitals. It lives on in our social welfare system. It lives on in correctional facilities," she said. "It lives in all those places we think of negative statistics, so it's very important we not overlook those voices."

While the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) has gathered more than 1,000 statements from aboriginal and non-aboriginal members of northern society from many corners of the North, Wilson, a Yellowknife resident married to former NWT premier Stephen Kakfwi, explained this week marks the first time the commission itself has accessed inmates at a correctional facility.

The NWT has one of the longest spanning histories of residential schools with several of the first schools to open and the last to close. As a consequence, the NWT has the highest number of residential school survivors in the country, according to the commission. At the North Slave Correctional Centre, 88 per cent of inmates are aboriginal, and of that, 80 per cent have been affected in some way by the residential school system.

"We know that residential school has affected families of survivors as well and some of those families that have entered the correctional system," said NWT Justice Minister Glen Abernethy.

"We want to make sure that anyone who has been impacted in any way has the option and ability to provide a statement."

This week's visit to the jail by the commission was an idea in the works for nearly two years, when Abernethy pledged his personal support to the project. Wilson explained that Abernethy was pivotal in helping mitigate various logistical issues such as security at the correctional centre.

By the beginning of the week, about 40 inmates registered to share their statements in a process that involved a video, tobacco ceremony and a shared component in which inmates listened attentively to one another. All personal statements were recorded privately in any language the inmates were most comfortable. A team of elders, traditional counsellors, and mental health and emotional support personnel were on-hand as support for inmates.

The result of the TRC's statement-gathering is an ever-growing patchwork of information on the legacy of residential schools from across the North and beyond. Wilson said the stories are both "unique" and "universal."

"They tell of things that are extremely consistent from one part of the country to the other, leaving no doubt in anyone's mind about the veracity of the story and the key lessons that we stand to learn from it as a society and country."

The goal of the TRC today, looking back over 150 years of history, is to aid the healing process for survivors directly impacted and inter-generational survivors indirectly impacted, as well as to educate those of whom were never affected themselves by the residential school system.

"For those of us, most of us, who learned nothing of this in our schools, we can start to learn and understand better," said Wilson.

"One of the most common expressions from those who did go to residential school is a tremendous expression of regret about the ways in which they raised their children, their inability to parent, their inability to express love and affection and sometimes very damaging things they passed on to their children because they themselves experienced it in residential school settings."

The TRC continues to look at causal links between the past residential school system and the disproportionately high number of indigenous Canadians in correctional facilities.

Meanwhile, ongoing programs offered through the North Slave Correctional Centre include a Healing Drum Society Embracing our Human-Nest program, an anger and emotion program, an elders network and a reintegration program. Also, TRC statement gatherers are at the jail through the end of the week, and the deputy warden explained inmates have a standing option to provide a statement whenever they choose.

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