First of all, thank you very much for your presentations. I think they speak loudly to some of the challenges you've addressed.
In one of my previous lives, I was a grand chief for six years. One of the biggest issues that emerged, of course, was funding. Logically, the next questions after that were: where do we direct the funding, and how do we invest strategically to support our students at the K to 12 and post-secondary levels?
In order to answer those questions, Mr. Matthew touches upon data collection, which helps drive strategies that come from the community level. If we don't know what our numbers are, how well we're doing, and where the challenges are, sometimes it's difficult for us to invest in those areas.
I'm a real strong supporter of data collection. In that light, I know that the Department of Indian Affairs doesn't really have an educational expertise; they collect numbers basically from a quantitative perspective. One of the things we're looking at here is trying to get the qualitative...an understanding of what works and what some of the best practices are.
My questions are going to be around funding, in one sense, and barriers on the other. I know if I had a chart in front of me, our population is going like this in the aboriginal community, the funding has basically flatlined, and the gap between the two is growing significantly. So directly, with respect to funding--and you've both identified issues there--could you comment on what that may mean for us as a people or for our students in the future?
The second thing is with respect to some of the barriers, aside from funding. Ms. Young specifically talked about housing. I know back home, because some of our bands don't tell students they are approved for funding until July, all the good housing is gone and they end up, for lack of a better term, in the ghetto, which affects their quality of life and the time dedicated to their studies. So maybe you could provide some thoughts on that as well.
And I have just a final thing. It seems to me that there's a critical mass of knowledge or information coming forward from successful programs such as you've both referred to—and I'll use the Saskatchewan context—whether it's Indian teacher education programs, native law centres, SIIT, and other support and access programs. They have the program at the U of W, the partnerships. It seems to me that we're starting to identify critical factors to success so that we can share those best practices and move forward quickly.
I don't know who wants to start, but maybe you could make some comments on those areas.