Thank you.
One of the things in Nova Scotia that we have now is legislation that recognizes the Mi'kmaq-L'nu language, which is a great thing that's more recent. But what we don't have...and as we have this language, some of it is going to supporting the indigenous languages in our own communities in Mi’kma’ki, Unama’ki, and beyond.
One of the things they have done is to have translated some of the curriculum outcomes and so on into Mi'kmaq, but the gap problem is that it's all around a eurocentric curriculum. We can put all kinds of Mi'kmaq language onto a eurocentric curriculum, but that doesn't help us to develop our indigenous knowledge, our indigenous knowledge traditions, or keep our knowledge traditions alive and well for the seventh generation.
What we're have right now are layers of assimilation that keep on supporting one knowledge system, and it does so by just adding into it a few content areas that are Mi'kmaq, but it doesn't really give the full nature and foundation of what indigenous knowledge is and what we're trying to retain for our children for the future.
I think all of those things that the province does, and also the federal government, do not provide the second layers of what we once did with the Aboriginal Learning Knowledge Centre, which was create another layer of an architecture of learning that extended beyond that eurocentric curriculum.
I think at this present time all of the governments working in education and learning need to build their foundations on the reconciliation of indigenous knowledge traditions in all of the systems. It is not just for us; it's for all of Canadians, and all of them could benefit from that in non-appropriated and ethical ways.