Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, and from what I understand, at one of the high schools—I believe it was in Attawapiskat—students would have to change classes and walk through the -30°C or -40°C weather to different trailers to change classes. It wasn't a great environment for them to be in. Also, I believe there was a fuel spill in the school.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Personally, I know of only one high school on reserve, and I don't believe it's funded as a high school. It's on the Wikwemikong unceded Indian reserve that's located on Manitoulin Island. I believe they do have some fundamental programs in math and physics. But again, with the way the school system is set up, your high school is pretty well predetermined before you even get in the front door when you're embarking on your high school journey.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  In my program? Do you mean through the Ontario First Nations Technical Services Corporation?

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We have one female indigenous engineer working for us right now, but we have two female engineers working on our team. Engineers are hard to recruit, but it's also difficult to get them to understand the differences working with the first nations community and the protocols that come in place depending on the community you're entering.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The field that I work in is very specific. We're looking for people with specific technical backgrounds. Most of the time we're looking for engineers or people who are in the water operator industry. The difficultly we have is that there aren't a lot of internship or co-operative programs to foster indigenous students to go to school, and then also to support them while they're doing their hours working toward their P.Eng.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  First of all, thank you. I would like to begin by acknowledging, again, the traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinabeg people. I also want to thank the committee for the opportunity to participate in this study pertaining to community capacity development and the retention of talent in the delivery of essential services on reserve.