INDIAN RESIDENTIAL SCHOOLS - A PICTURE OF THE PAST By Brian Northgrave (Article)

Brian Northgrave

Canadians - aboriginals and non-aboriginals - agree that what matters most is a better future for First Nations youth.  There is also wide agreement that there should be reconciliation over a difficult past as we look to the future.  Reconciliation calls for trying to understand that past. 

Our reading club has tackled that challenge several times, reading and discussing books, following the media, listening to different views.   The most inclusive document is, of course, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report, that impressive 3,500 page document that took years to complete and benefited from the work of its twenty five researchers.

That Report included, as an annex, a document entitled “Indian Residential Schools – Research Study of the Child Care Programs Nine Residential Schools in Saskatchewan”.   In 1966, the Government of Saskatchewan wanted to know how the provinces nine residential schools in the province were doing.  The Province selected a consultant, the consultant prepared questionnaires, and hired people to go and talk to students, to school directors, teachers and child care workers  that were at the schools, and to former students that had attended them.  Of all the time I spent seeking to understand the Indian Residential School system, the most useful couple of hours were those I spent on reading the Saskatchewan report.

A link to The Saskatchewan report is here

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