Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Oct. 17th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

I'll let Madame Cloutier go ahead.

[Edith Cloutier]

I would just like to add to that answer by specifically mentioning the Université du Québec's strategic plan. The last plan that I agreed to work on, as a member of the Board of Directors, takes its inspiration from the principle of developing services for the First Nations by devoting a university pavilion to them, with a view to allowing First Nations to eventually take control. After formulating that strategic plan, we developed a strategic intervention plan by establishing a committee of First Nations people whose specific task was to define the vision that would inform the First Nations Pavilion.

Based on that strategic plan, we held consultations all across the Anishnabe territory in both Algonquin and Cree communities. I presented the project to the chiefs of the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador, who voiced their support for this initiative. We made a joint commitment to it in anticipation of the socio-economic forum; we are mobilizing the main stakeholders with a view to garnering their support for this visionary project which could, of course, lead to great things as far as education is concerned.

At the same time, we obviously hope that the expertise developed across that entire area by the University of Quebec and the First Nations will be exportable, so to speak, to other areas of the country. I believe there is a significant need out there. However, there is no one solution, as Lise was saying. A number of tools have to be made available to the First Nations. The Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue, or UQAT, and First Nations people are prepared to share that expertise.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Mr. Merasty is next.

[Gary Merasty, Liberal, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

First, let me thank you again for your presentation.

A big part of addressing the first nations education question in this country has forced us to focus on debunking myths. As a grand chief for six years before I got elected here, one of my biggest struggles was trying to take the attention away from the myths that are perpetuated with quantitative reports that don't look at the qualitative aspects and don't look at the successes of first nations programs.

The myth says the provinces do a better job, that the gap is our fault, our community's fault, our students' fault, that our students are less academic. As a result, it takes the focus away from the successes happening in our communities. This is what's been most troublesome for me over the years.

An elder told me once that if you focus on poverty, you'll achieve poverty; if you focus on prosperity, you'll achieve prosperity. And because these stats are sensationalized, it causes governments and others to focus on the poverty or the bad news in these reports.

I'm very happy you talked about the successes you've achieved in each of your organizations. In the context of Saskatchewan, my home province, I know our teacher education program--TEP--our native law centre, the aboriginal MBA program, are all experiencing graduation rates of 90% or so. The importance of the culture match to the students and the extension into the community speaks volumes to the model we should look at.

Mr. Whiteduck talked about student support, the PSSP, and institutional support, the ISSP. And I've been told, “Gary, don't focus on the money”, but I think the solutions are in the community, and we have to empower the communities to be able to share and activate these solutions.

Without realizing or understanding that, if you have a graph, our population is going at a 45-degree angle from the corner of this graph, and the funding has been going like this. So the gap grows every year, because we have a population group. What will happen if we don't fund the current models we have, the PSSP and the ISSP? For you to continue the success you have, what will happen if that funding isn't increased?

[Gilbert Whiteduck]

I'm pleased you brought the issue of success to our attention, because we've had many successes, both in programs that have been delivered and by the many young people who have returned to the community to take on some very important roles. We need to celebrate that, and too often, you're right, we forget and we look very much on the negative side.

But if the funding is not increased to allow students to pursue vocational training, post-secondary education of one kind or another, what I see from my travels into my own community is that the social issues and the social turmoil in our communities is not going to get better. What's going to occur is we're going to be leading into more and more confrontation, because people at one point are going to have to react. I believe you'll be hearing more of roadblocks or whatever. How else do you get attention? People are saying that is not what we want. We'd rather put our energies into something that's going to work and work toward that, but when you don't have a choice, you tell me what you do.

I sat on the national working group on education under Minister Nault, and we concluded there were 6,000 reports on first nations education in this country.

You're right, the solutions are found with the community. Our organization and the communities are prepared to work with INAC to move forward meaningfully, to find solutions that are going to work, to celebrate and keep talking about the positive, to keep looking forward, and not looking at what's lacking, but looking at the potential we need to draw upon.

[Gary Merasty, Liberal, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

One of the successful models I've seen out there is to bring the post-secondary institutions closer to the community. This was a statement that was made by I think virtually all of you. This extension is absolutely critical because of the population growth, and because some of our aboriginal institutions or the institutions in partnership with first nations, such as the Cree School Board and the James Bay Cree, are at the doorstep of these communities. We're at the doorstep of the communities, and I see giving the first experience in post-secondary education as close to the community as we can as such an effective model to launch them into the mainstream, if I can use that term.

We need to look at this a bit more. When you do this, you identify and ensure a cultural match, you help alleviate some of the stresses from moving away from home, plus you introduce what it is to be in post-secondary.

My question, though, is this. We have HRSD, which does the vocational or the technical, and we have INAC, which does the PSSP, and they don't necessarily talk. It's not necessarily the fault of any government now or in the past, but I see that this connection needs to occur.

Can you elaborate a bit more on how important that is as we move forward?

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Would you be fairly brief in answering that question? We're running over on the time allotted.

[Lise Bastien]

I think it's really important to have that discussion between different ministries, but we've been talking about this for a long time as first nations to ministries, and it doesn't happen. We can't wait, if they don't want to talk to each other. It's the same thing with Industry Canada and Indian Affairs when they talk about technology in schools.

So I think it's really important that this discussion happen, but meanwhile we need to find a solution for immediate projects. It's really important. We started discussion at the community level and regional level, and we are talking to each other, and we favour these discussions between services and programs. I think it's really important and more efficient.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Mr. Bruinooge.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'd like to also thank everyone for coming out this morning. It's always good to get a perspective from every region, and I think we've done a very good job today in finding representation from the province of Quebec.

If I have enough time, and I'm not sure I do, I'd like to ask a question to each group, if possible. I'll start with Mr. Whiteduck.

You spoke a bit about building the base and having the right academic qualifications to succeed. I want to have you expand upon some of the factors you think need to be in place to accentuate that base, perhaps to ensure that students are able to seamlessly move into the post-secondary school of their choice, be it one with a first nations cultural sense to it, or perhaps another one in the United States, or wherever they choose to go to study. Could you expand on that?

[Gilbert Whiteduck]

I could speak at length about that, but let me give you a few examples that I believe are important. First of all, we need to address the issue of the funding support going to primary and secondary education. We need to look at the whole funding formula to ensure that teachers are paid at par, so that you can recruit the best-qualified teachers and do some work at the community level. We in the FNEC, like Minister Prentice, have been talking about second-level services. They are essential in ensuring that the standards and the quality in first nations schools are at par. We hope that the new government is prepared to move on this. It will reinforce what's already been going on in first nations schools. There's been some good work in first nations schools. It's just that there's a lot more that needs to be done. I'm hoping that people are prepared to move forward.

In preparing for a socio-economic forum, we put forward what we believed was a major proposal for moving to second-level services, only to be told that the new government wasn't necessarily prepared to move as quickly as we wanted to. We saw this as a unique opportunity to put in place the templates, accountability mechanisms, and community support necessary to prepare our young people to make the transition. When we talk about our own first nations institutions, all we're saying is that we want to give our young people a choice. It doesn't mean they're going to go to the first nations institution, and that's fine. If they choose to go mainstream, their sense of identity will be stronger. This is the key. When they leave the community, if their sense of identity is threatened in any way, a lot of them will come right back. We think stronger high school level, stronger preparation, will allow for a transition to be made more easily and for people to see that there are opportunities.

I am talking about the on-reserve situation, but many first nations students attend provincial schools. So there's quite a bit of work to be done within the provincial schools. The success rate at the high schools in the province is not all that much better than what's going on in the community. So a dialogue with the ministry of education, certainly in Quebec, is critical. The federal government needs to be there to come and push the movement forward.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Mr. Blackned, within your community, is there any tracking of graduates who move into the workforce ? Is there any sense of the success rate in various vocations? Is there an opportunity out there for the majority of graduates from your community?

[Gordon Blackned]

I don't think there is per se a tracking arrangement for our post-secondary students. We try to guide them to training, university, or college programs that would gear them to positions required within the Cree territory, like teachers or medical people. But the fields our students graduate in are not necessarily the ones they go into for jobs or careers.

Our communities are small. The economic development of our communities is not large enough to accommodate positions related to the training they've received. So you will encounter accountants and such without jobs. We are getting people in positions that their training hasn' t prepared them for.

As for the jobs that exist in our communities, take the teacher training program. It is the responsibility of the Cree School Board. Under the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement, the school board is supposed to train Cree teachers. We've developed many teachers. A lot of them have gone into our schools and taught. Others have gone off into other jobs. There is no consistency in training. When you get through your program, there is no guarantee there is going to be a job available. This is a problem we face in our territory.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, could I just have one more short question?

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

No, I'm sorry.

We'll have Mr. Lévesque, please.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Now you understand why I am so proud to represent the people of the riding of Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, as well as my constituency Abitibi-Témiscamingue, which is where the President is from.

I should also make Committee members aware of the fact that with us today is Mr. Lemire, who was previously the Executive Director of the Regional Abitibi-Témiscamingue Development Board and who, as early as the 1980s, understood the need to acknowledge, nation to nation, an entire society's participation in this country's economic development.

I had the honour of working with Mr. Lemire, and I want to convey my greetings. I also want to convey my greetings to Mr. Blackned, who gave us the benefit of his time and his culture, and even sacrificed his time hunting, to come and appear before the Committee today. I hope he brought us a moose.

I also want to convey greetings to Edith.

I travel from the east coast of my riding, which is the coast of Labrador, to the western end on the border of the province of Quebec. In my riding, there are Algonquins, Abenakis, Atikamekw, Cree, Inuit and Naskapis. All of them are proud workers who are only asking to have the tools they need to develop. Indeed, with the few tools we have provided the Cree -- not all of them, but some of them, at least -- Canada and Quebec -- yes, that's what I said -- will develop much more quickly than they are now.

I have had dealings with Mr. Blackned and with the Université du Québec. I know that there is no information on this, but based on your knowledge of the education sector, could Mr. Blackned tell us how many students are unable to pursue post-secondary studies because they have to leave their home and their culture? And of those who do leave, how many come back to their community to work?

How much does it cost the Cree School Board when students decide to pursue their studies outside the community?

[Gordon Blackned]

That's a good question. I don't have statistics with me right now. I'll have to go from memory here.

The percentage of graduates who do go out to post-secondary institutions--secondary five graduates--I would say is around 40% to 50% at the outset. As I said, others will wait maybe a year, two years, three years before they pursue post-secondary studies. Of those who go out and eventually graduate with a specific discipline, 100% will come back to the community. They will eventually find a job suitable to them, or something related to that, but most of the time, as I said, it won't be related unless they specifically take particular programs like the teacher training program I was talking about.

To board and educate children away from their home communities is very expensive; it is quite a lot of money to invest. There were concerns raised here regarding the level of funding being received by post-secondary students. I think first nations are faced with that problem across the country.

We in the Cree School Board are also faced with that funding problem. We constantly receive requests from our students for additional funds, because in certain localities where they're located to study, it's very difficult for them to find accommodations. Because they're first nations, for one thing, sometimes the landlords turn them away. The other aspect is difficulty finding areas to lease or rent for the duration of their studies, because of an influx of larger populations of non-native students who would be coming into a particular community.

I have relatives who have gone out this fall. Some of them have had to relocate; after a week or two of searching for an apartment or something like that, they've had to go to another city to take up their studies, because that's where they were able to find accommodation for the time that they would be studying. In that regard, it does cost a lot of money for travel. In our territory, travel costs are astronomical because of the distance our students have to travel.

But in the long run, when you look at the percentage of 40% to 50% going out to study, and then 100% coming back to fulfill their obligations to the community in whatever capacity they can, it is quite a considerable success for us.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Mr. Albrecht is next.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to each of the participants today.

I have a few general questions, but I'm going to try to focus in on some of the more specific ones.

Mr. Whiteduck, you mentioned that a cap of 2% per year has been in place since 1997. Can you help me understand a bit about the timing and rationale for that? Also, how does it compare to funding for non-aboriginal people at the post-secondary level in Canada? Do you know? I don't have any idea what it is.

[Gilbert Whiteduck]

Well, what occurred was that at the beginning of the 1990s there was a decision not to work on a regional need.

The regional Indian Affairs office would determine what the need was, and then the funding would be provided to the region within an envelope. It got frozen, and then all that was going to be given was 2% per year for cost of living--basically, barely--so it wasn't keeping up with the demographics and the needs. Communities were given envelopes to work within; if they ran out of money, then there was a priority list of who would have access. Continuing students would continue to be funded, and what not. It made it very challenging, because now it was the community that had to tell a student who may have left. A young woman may have gotten pregnant and had to leave; when she wants to return a year or two later, she has to be told she's on the waiting list. That creates frustration, and they often give up.

In regard to what funding is available to non-first-nations students, I'm not so clear about that, because the program is obviously administered differently.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Could I just follow up, as well? I'm beginning to learn a little more about the educational needs of the aboriginal community as well as of the other provinces.

I'm not from Quebec. You mentioned that vocational training in Quebec is offered at the high school level and that there's no access to post-secondary education in terms of vocational skills at the college level. Can you just expand on that? I'm having trouble understanding. What does the college level then provide for aboriginal students?

[Gilbert Whiteduck]

The college level would offer pre-university.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

But there is no vocational school.

[Gilbert Whiteduck]

Well, there is. For example, there is nursing, technology, three-year programs, and what not. When I'm speaking about vocational, it might be carpentry. It might be some of the other skills. Algonquin College, here in Ottawa, offers all of those at the post-secondary level. So students who want to go.... It's odd, because those first nations communities that are on the border with Ontario are able to send their students to them and have that funded under post-secondary. Those that are further are unable to do so.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Okay, that's helpful.

And finally, if I could have another half a minute, Ms. Bastien, you mentioned that during your time in education there was an institution that was specifically for aboriginal people, and it was closed. Could you just give me a bit of a history of that?