Thank you for joining us.
First of all, your presence here today impresses me. More extraordinary still is the fact that you have completed post-secondary studies. You have to admit that this is quite rare in aboriginal communities, too rare in fact. That's why we made the decision to study the future of post-secondary education in aboriginal communities. I'd like to congratulate you personally--and probably on behalf of all my colleagues here--for achieving such a high level of education.
I come from a small town in the Abitibi region called Amos. It is located some six hours north of here by automobile. We had one native residential in town. Over the years, we always managed to segregate natives from non-natives.
Your observations are a very accurate reflection of the events of the 1960s and 1970s which unfortunately, resulted in many First Nations losing their culture, a culture that today they are attempting to reclaim.
Mr. Matthew said something very important and it has stuck with me: Learning to live in a modern world almost cost us our culture. Now we must learn to sustain it.
My question is for Mr. Matthew. How can aboriginal culture be sustained through post-secondary studies? Let me give you one example. Back home in Rouyn-Noranda, the Cree own all of the buildings in which students from the North reside while attending school. These residences have been adapted to meet their needs. I wanted to point this out because at least something is being done somewhere. Perhaps communities should...
Sadly, there are no such residences in Winnipeg, Regina or Montreal where members of First Nations can meet, without necessarily feeling cut off from the rest of the world.
Ms. Young, your MA thesis is extremely interesting. Could the Library of Parliament possibly get a copy of it for inclusion in our files? In my view, it touches on a number of very important issues.
How does a person, often someone from a remote aboriginal community, manage not be assimilated into so-called Canadian society when he or she relocates to a large city to the South to study medicine, law or some other discipline? Is there a particular approach we could advocate or a recommendation that we could include in our report?
Those are my two questions.