Kâomoodo.
Thank you for having us here today.
Dechinta has been filling the post-secondary education gap in the NWT for the past decade. Dechinta offers quality-assured accreditation in indigenous studies taught by elder professors, indigenous faculty and community bush guides. Dechinta is the only fully accredited land-based program in Canada and the world. Dechinta offers accessible admission for individuals who need it most.
The NWT has one of the highest dropout rates in the country. Dechinta is able to provide a solution to this problem by implementing transition programs for students. The majority of our students are women. This is largely because women are able to bring their children with them to Dechinta. This reduces barriers to education for single mothers who are unable to afford child care. It is proven that when indigenous women hold degrees, unemployment rates decrease drastically. Supporting women who are actively pursuing higher education supports everyone in the community.
At this time, we are able to host two semesters per year, with an average of 12 students per semester, not including the children who attend our KidsU Chekoa program, which provides children with confidence in the classroom and on the land. Dechinta would like to offer multiple concurrent semesters in all regions of the NWT year-round, but it is difficult for us to do this important work because we do not have the funds available to us. To offer continuity for our students, we require funding.
Dechinta has unanimous support from the indigenous leaders of the north. Also, we recently conducted a poll asking whether or not residents of the north felt that a land-based university was an important component of education in the NWT, and 100% of respondents agreed that it was crucial to the north.
Dechinta is not just a job for me. It is something that I strongly believe in. I was once a young single mother wanting to go back to school, but I had to leave the north, and that was a very hard choice for me to make. I almost didn't go. If Dechinta had been around when I first set out on my educational pursuits, there is no doubt that I would have been a student there. I wouldn't have had to uproot my children and my life to go down south for higher education, which was very difficult to do, with very little support.
Dechinta is life-changing. Every student I've seen come through this program has transformed into the best version of themselves. It needs this government's support now more than ever.