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Truth-telling, Reconciliation and Community Events: Effective Activities for the Communities. Kloshe Tillicum: Healthy People|Healthy Relations BC & YT Network environments for Aboriginal Health research.
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Truth-telling, Reconciliation and Community Events: Effective Activities for the Communities Kloshe Tillicum: Healthy People|Healthy RelationsBC & YT Network environments for Aboriginal Health research
Kloshe Tillicum: Healthy People| Healthy Relations is one of nine Network Environments for Aboriginal Health Research (NEAHR) Funded by Canadian Institutes of Health Research: Institute of Aboriginal Peoples’ Health About us
Kloshe Tillicum Research themes • Traditional Knowledge • Ethics • Public Health and Health Promotion • Complex Interactions About us
BC Community identified themes Chronic diseases Diabetes Nutrition and Food security Mental Health Issues Trauma Sexual abuse Residential school healing
KT Co-Principal Investigators Rod McCormick is a Mohawk psychologist and Counselling Psychology Professor based at UBC. Rod is an expert in Aboriginal mental health and his work integrates cultural, social, and environmental components of health (complex interactions). In exploring indigenous psychologies and traditional ways of healing, Rods research also intersects with our theme of Indigenous knowledge and traditional medicine. Dr. McCormick also works as a consultant and researcher to several Aboriginal and non Aboriginal governments and organizations in the areas of program and policy development and evaluation. Rod is the Nominated Principal Investigator of Kloshe Tillicum.
KT Co-Principal Investigators Laura Arbour is a pediatrician and medical geneticist at UBC, based at the UBC Vancouver Island Medical Program in Victoria. She has a cross affiliation with the University of Victoria. Well known for her work in carrying out genetic research with Aboriginal people in BC and northern Canada (Long QT Syndrome, primary biliary cirrhosis, Carnitine-palmitoyl-transferase type 1a),
KT Co-Principal Investigators Jody Butler Walker is a community-based research innovator who has lived and worked in the North for over 25 years. In her 12 years in the Yukon, she has worked with many Yukon First Nations communities, and since founding the Arctic Health Research Network-Yukon in 2007, she has been building on recommendations garnered directly from Yukon First Nations communities, with a focus on complex interactions, ethics and health promotion.
KT Co-Principal Investigators Eduardo Jovel is an indigenous ethno-botanist at the University of British Columbia with specific interest in indigenous knowledges and medicines as well as public health and health promotion through food safety and nutrition, organic farming and environmental health. He has research projects in BC, the Andes and Ecuador.
KT Co-Principal Investigators Chris Lalonde is a psychologist at the University of Victoria with a focus on Aboriginal health, specifically the relations between identity formation and suicide risk among Aboriginal adolescents and young adults. His work includes ethics research in an indigenous context and a significant Aboriginal post-secondary student retention study.
KT Co-Principal Investigators Nadine Caron is the first indigenous woman to graduate from UBCs medical school and since then has made increasing Aboriginal representation in the Medical Profession a career goal. As a General and Endocrine Surgeon, Dr. Caron is a UBC Assistant Professor, Surgery who works with its Northern Medical program.
KT Co-Principal Investigators Richard Vedan is Secwepemc and is an Associate Professor in Social Work and Family Studies at UBC. His interests include mental health, best practices for Aboriginal health, health promotion, homelessness, Aboriginal traditional cultural knowledge, capacity building and establishment of service delivery methods that integrate traditional and non-indigenous practices.
Indian Residential School Survivors Gathering, Kamloops BC Research Report on “Voicing the Past”
Indian Residential School Survivors Society (1994) • unique, not-for-profit, provincial Aboriginal agency • supports, advocates and develops policy on behalf of residential school survivors • direct service to survivors in the form of crisis counselling; information and referrals; and education and capacity-building for communities • support for workers through training, referrals, and complementary supports • began in 1994 as a working committee and then a sub-organization of the First Nations Summit. The First Nation Summit is composed of fifty-one B.C. First Nations governmental and political bodies, representing more than 70% of all Aboriginal populations in British Columbia. • March 2002, IRSSS formally became the Indian Residential School Survivors Society • mandate is to assist Aboriginal peoples in British Columbia to recognize and be holistically empowered from the primary and generational effects of residential schools by supporting research, promoting awareness, establishing partnerships and advocating for justice and healing. Background
Truth and Reconciliation Commission was launched in June 2009 to contribute to truth, healing and reconciliation of all those affected including : First Nations, Inuit and Métis former Indian Residential School (IRS) students, their families, communities, religious entities, former school employees, government and the people of Canada. The truth telling and reconciliation process as part of an overall holistic and comprehensive response to the Indian Residential School legacy is an acknowledgement of the injustices and harms experienced by Aboriginal people and the need for continued healing. This is a commitment to establish a new relationship embedded in mutual recognition and respect. There are a few activities that have been established to achieve their mandate and one of them is the community events. The truth and reconciliation commission has outlined semi-structured community events in the following manner: Truth and Reconciliation Commission
(B) Community Events It is intended that the community events will be designed by communities and respond to the needs of the former students, their families and those affected by the IRS legacy including the special needs of those communities where Indian Residential Schools were located. The community events are for the purpose of: (a) acknowledging the capacity of communities to develop reconciliation practices; (b) developing collective community narratives about the impact of the IRS system on former students, families and communities; (c) involving church, former school employees and government officials in the reconciliation process, if requested by communities;
(d) creating a record or statement of community narratives – including truths, insights and recommendations - for use in the historical research and report, national events, and for inclusion in the research centre; (e) educating the public and fostering better relationships with local communities; (f) allowing for the participation from high level government and church officials, if requested by communities; (g) respecting the goal of witnessing in accordance with Aboriginal principles.
The Commission, during the first stages of the process in consultation with the IRSSC, shall develop the core criteria and values consistent with the Commission’s mandate that will guide the community processes. Within these parameters communities may submit plans for reconciliation processes to the Commission and receive funding for the processes within the limits of the Commission’s budgetary capacity.
The TRC will review each NOTICE OF COMMUNITY EVENT FORM carefully. In deciding which Community Events to attend, which ones to fund, and to what extent the TRC is able to provide funding, the TRC will seek to ensure that these decisions are guided by the following criteria. Does the event: Criteria • focus on survivors and their families and communities; • opportunity for Statement Gathering • include community and school histories and documentation (including photographs); • include both traditional and contemporary artistic expressions of the residential school experience and impact, such as poetry, writing, painting, sculpting, bead or button work, quilting, song writing, films or plays; • respect the goal of witnessing in accordance with traditional ancestral principles; • include Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal partnerships and collaborations; • include reconciliation or commemoration gestures; • focus on specific perspectives that may be under-represented at general community events; • invite a broad range of the general public to attend; • contribute to regional fairness in which communities are funded. TRC Community Event Criteria
As part of its education process, the Indian Residential School Survivors Society (IRSSS) embarked on a series of sessions to inform BC communities about the TRC. During the course of those workshops, IRSSS was asked by communities to host a demonstration event so that communities could: • Learn about the TRC; • Learn about things to consider when planning TRC events; • See examples of what TRC events might look like; and • Begin discussing the planning process of their own events Rationale
Individual Statement Taking Group Statement Taking Public Statements Residential School Play Residential School Museum Tour Tour of Kamloops Residential School Individual Church & Gov’t Apologies Public Church & Gov’t Statements Video commentary Guest Books Ceremony Circles Celebrations Types of Events
Participants This was a pilot program evaluation which examined attitudinal change for the participants in an effort to gain a structured understanding of the gathering. Participants were a mixture of Indian residential school survivors, intergenerational survivors and others (see Figure 1). Methodology
No other identifying data other than self labeling regarding survivor, intergeneration, or “other”, was required. Researcher is from Kamloops Band. Methodology
Quantitative and Qualitative Measures A brief pre and post test was distributed to participants and each participant was encouraged to hand in both the pre and post test. Incentives for participation were in the form of a ticket for a draw as the tests were submitted per day. The data gathering occurred over a two day period and a draw was performed at the end of each day. In order to maintain confidentiality, each pre and post test was assigned the same number for future reference. Embedded in the post test was a series of qualitative questions relating to the original questions as well as some additional questions relevant to community truth and reconciliation events. Methodology
There were limitations to the qualitative component of the pilot study because of significant changes in both the number of participants and in their continuity of participation. Although a pre and post test pairing was attempted (a set of pre and post test surveys with the same number per person), the number of pair-able responses was low. Limitations
Qualitative responses were categorized in terms of themes independently from the two researchers analysis of the data. Those responses that lacked a clear explanation (e.g. I don’t know, Yes, No, etc.) were excluded. Qualitative Results
