Episode 2 - Unreconciled - Education

Welcome to Article 14. The podcast that looks at education, through and indigenous lens, tries to answer some of the nagging questions that both indigenous and non-indigenous educators have around the delivery of uncolonial, sovereign, indigenous education. In this season of Article 14, we are using Jesse Wente's memoir "I'm Reconciled." In this episode, we discussed identity and representation through sharing our own experiences in colonial education institutions. Today, we are joined by Dr. Kira Brandt-Bierkopf and Nick Bertrand to discuss education. In his book, Wente discusses his own experience as an urban indigenous student. While he praises the efforts of many teachers who embed indigenous content into their programs with care, he points out the disproportionalities of indigenous students in the education system today, from low graduation rates to high levels of suspensions. He states that indigenous kids shouldn't have to conform to sacrifice who they are to get an education. Period. So hello everyone, I'm Nicole Reynolds, the coordinator of indigenous education for the Peele District School Board. Hi everyone, I'm Allison Cunningham, I'm the coordinator for the new teacher induction program side by side at the Peele District School Board. I'm Jayden Gibson, I'm the elementary indigenous education resource teacher for the Peele District School Board. Hi, I'm David Babcock, I'm the secondary indigenous resource teacher for the Peele District School Board. And we're welcoming some special guests today, so we'd like them to introduce themselves. Beautiful, thank you Nicole, good morning all. My name is Kira Brandt, Birrakov, Mike Aningham, and I'm a student professor of indigenous education in our faculty at York University. Segal, Segal, Segal, good morning everyone, my name is Nick Bertrand, I'm an education officer with the Ministry of Education and looking forward to our conversation here this morning. Thanks so much for setting us up. Thank you, and thanks for being here. So today, the purpose of this conversation is on education for reconciliation. And I was hoping some of you could speak to how can we ensure that we are upholding the distinct rights of indigenous students in our schools, and try not to fall in the trap that indigenous education falls under like an equity umbrella, but indigenous education is more about sovereignty and self-determination. Well, that's a big question. I'm going to try and be kind of quick on some initial thoughts. Yeah, Nicole, I think it's a really important thing we need to consider in education that how indigenous education has evolved over the years has been good in many ways, but problematic in others. And when I think about the problems, you mentioned one way or another of the date, which is the fact that we seem to find ourselves positioning the work of indigenous education within an equity paradigm. And I just, you know, I think there's a couple of truths we need to come to terms with in order to understand how that's a problem. You know, I think the first foundational truth that I often speak about is that we need to fully appreciate and understand that the current education system that we're in that's operating on mass within Ontario and within other jurisdictions across these lands is that, you know, that education system was designed for indigenous people and in complete absence of them. And we need to understand that the primary goal of that system was, you know, really to impart Eurocentric ways of knowing and doing and being. And we all, well, I really hope that we all know, you know, that type of system was employed in extremely violent ways. We don't have to look very far into our past, understand the damage that residential schools has done and continues to do in an intergenerational way. So that's the first truth we need to understand about education for indigenous people was that it was designed for in an absence of us. The second piece that I think is critical around unpacking the piece around equity and indigenous education is that, you know, we need to take a step back from this and look, you know, look at this from a whole, at the whole forest and understand that, you know, first nations people were, were the original people of this land. And with that comes inherent rights that are derived from the land. And we've always been and will continue to be a self-determining people. And we have it within these lands and within the relationship with, you know, with Europeans who came here, we exercise that sovereignty through the treaty making process based on nation to nation relationships. And when we, how do I say this? When we deny or we choose to not acknowledge, we choose to not uphold that distinct relationship. And in education, one of the ways we do that is by positioning it as an equity-like work. To me, that is the continuation of the 250 years of erasure that we've been experiencing. But also, ultimately, it's the continuation of oppression and colonialism. So what I, what I guess what I'm trying to say is, is to your point earlier today is that we have these distinct rights. And yes, we intersect with the goals and aspirations of equity seeking peoples, but it's very different and distinct. Because of these distinct rights, you know, we really shouldn't be consulted with and brought into. We should have people coming to our tables. I guess the most important endearing message of all of this is that we're, you know, what we're trying to do, not just in education, but across all institutions, is reclaim our own, but also acknowledging that, you know, we may need to do some work within those colonial institutions. What we're trying to do is we're trying to solidify our sovereignty and self-determination. And understanding those distinct rights from a treaty perspective, from a Canadian Constitution perspective is critical. And if we don't have that knowledge and we don't have that understanding, we're going to continue to see problems because we need to be at the table and we need to be having our own tables for these conversations and education. So I'm going to lead with that because it's such a big question, and I'm going to flip it to you because, oh my goodness, I could get going on a tangent here and I don't want to do that. Yeah. I think we should. I think it'll snow ball in it. And that's way possible, Nick. And I'm just so inspired by your response because I think that in and of itself is just significant framework. If we start with that framework and by understanding this history and by understanding the legacy of which we were inheriting within our education system that we particularly find ourselves in particularly in Ontario and we're looking at the colonial legacy in teacher education of mandatory schooling of so many different layers that we inherit. So it's really beyond this idea of the content and that the curriculum and the curricular choices that we make in the classroom, which I think is by default where we often turn to when it comes to thinking about fixing the education system for Indigenous folks. But it's these broader systems that we really inherit that really need our our tending to and our attention to with with what Nick is saying in regards to thinking about rights in relation to sovereignty in relation to our relationship with land. I think one of the biggest misconceptions that we really need to address is when I think when Nick and I particularly being Hoda Nishone people are speaking about rights, I think it almost needs to be reframed and redefined as to how, ongoing way people understand this notion of rights. And we might be perhaps more familiar with this concept of rights in relation to responsibilities of course. Often we often speak about rights and responsibilities as as being complimentary to one another. But I think what's important is from an ongoing perspective when we speak of rights and when we wake up in the morning and we need to acknowledge rights and responsibilities in relation to the land and in relation to the medicines, it really begins with the self of I uphold my end to the bargain. I uphold what it is that I need to be doing to keep this reciprocal relationship going because I'm not entitled to anything and I really do think that in a colonial settler framework the notion of rights, I have the right to do this really becomes conflated with entitlement and with privilege of I'm actually entitled to this. When for us it's so heavily grounded in where is my end of the bargain to uphold this reciprocal relationship and when that's been broken for so long or at least in the relationship of colonial schooling in Canada, that end of the bargain of my responsibility to indigenous youth, to indigenous families and future generations really is just starting to be established by individual folks, right? By our administrators, by our educators, by our policymakers, but at an institutional level that's certainly never been recognized or formalized and if we fail to I think recognize what is my responsibility and really try to institutionalize this in terms of moving beyond this add-inster, right? That the cherry pick kind of band-aid measures, it's a bit of a losing battle until that's really redressed and so what does that look like and how it's taken up, I think, really needs to be done in relation to the communities and the lands of which we're on. I lived in Ottawa for so long that needed to look really different of being not only in the nation's capital but on unseated Algonquin territory and now as someone who's new to Toronto I need to figure out what that looks like for us here being on these treaty plans and so to kind of create these broad stroke frameworks of what needs to be done, it needs to be quite localized but that doesn't mean that these conversations can't begin but it certainly begins with the self and I think really being quite careful with the language that we're using and finding those meeting places as to how might we be misunderstanding what another in relation to some of the language that we're using, how is it that the original peoples of this land might be using familiar terms but in a very different context. Wow, thank you both. You gave us a lot to think about and I think I like how you brought up our responsibility because I think for non-indigenous educators within the school system it is the responsibility to understand indigenous rights, indigenous sovereignty, indigenous self-determination so that through decision making and indigenous education indigenous peoples are at the forefront and not an afterthought. I know many emails I've had to send or sometimes I feel like an advocate to get to the table, right? Because a lot of times people think that because you have someone from equity at the table they're covering all their bases, right? And I think we're starting to see a shift where indigenous education is separate but it comes with a lot of learning and I want to welcome Kayla who is joined us so Kayla is a P.L. District School Board student and maybe Kayla I'm going to put you on the spot. Do you want to tell us a little bit of your experience in P.L. as an indigenous student in education system? Yeah, sure, and nice to meet you guys. I'm sorry for being late. When it comes to my experiences in P.L. I've been pretty fortunate to have a pretty good experience in P.L. I think it's a generally good environment in terms of the schools that I've been to. There's a couple things here and there in regards to misinformation from different classes that I've been in like history classes or one geography class we spoke about recently. But I think generally speaking it's been a pretty good experience but that's partially because there hasn't been enough education for anything to be particularly harmful. I think that if there was more time for there to be mistakes made by my teachers and things it probably would have happened but in my classes we haven't had much experience with indigenous voices and things so there hasn't been much of an opportunity to mess up. But I will say that there are a lot of advancements being made in terms of one particular course which I'm in which is the indigenous voices English course. And I know that going forward at course is becoming mandatory. Going into further years it will be mandatory for grade 11s to take the indigenous literature course. So that's definitely a good thing and it is marking advancement in the education system which I'm excited for. Yes, you bring up a good point and these are conversations that the indigenous education team have been having with curriculum and things like that about making this course and be three mandatory. But a lot of the conversation is how can we make it so when you get to grade 11 it's not the first time you're reading indigenous literature or you're talking about true histories and contributions and treaties and all those things. And I want to open it up to Nick and Keira to see if they have anything if they want to respond to what Kayla said or talk about implementing education for reconciliation in schools. I'll start us off here first Nick in thinking about it's so true of once we make I think these really exciting strides in terms of making this course mandatory. We've really patted ourselves on the back and as the daughter of an administrator and so when it worked for the ministry I know that it is something to applaud once we make these big changes certainly. But that in and of itself it should give us the momentum to continue to move forward. I know being on the other side of seeing our students that have gone through often some schooling in Ontario when I see them in our teacher education program and our faculties of education in Ontario. There are sometimes at least has a late has become a sense of when they come into my classroom and we're often having conversations around indigenous education. It used to be very much pre-TRC that they were so hungry for indigenous education because it was something they wanted and they hadn't had any indigenous perspectives whereas now we're kind of getting some students who have had a few opportunities to engage with it at least in their high school or their secondary years. But there's sometimes is the perception of oh I've already done this because I've already had a few books or because I've taken a course we've already done indigenous education. And so the responsibility to really make sure it is embedded in a way that recognizes indigenous knowledge as a valid knowledge system that is complex that deserves time throughout their schooling system then really helps to debunk this idea that indigenous education is something which can be accomplished in one course and that can be checked off the list and it's something that really can kind of be contained. This is an indigenous literature course as compared to the complexity of indigenous knowledge that really needs to be sat with. And so the power of being able to do that early and consistently and quite fluently is certainly the dream but I'm very biased as a teacher educator and a faculty of education. We need to make sure that we're preparing our teachers in the right way to be able to do this. It's one thing to tell a teacher this is now what we're doing. It's another thing to make sure we're preparing our teachers to do justice to this so that we don't have our calos in the classroom that are like this is great that it's on the table but what's going to be messed up? What's going to be done wrong? And then those harms are really perpetuated under the best intentions but it's really our indigenous students that pay that price if it's done poorly. Absolutely. I'm in full agreement and we think about the ways that we implement just to build on what you've said here. You know, it's a really interesting time and education right. I just said that this is a system that's done a tremendous amount of harm to our people. And now what we're doing is we're saying to indigenous people come back, come back and bring your stories, come back and bring your experiences and help us move forward. So yeah, we always have to keep that in mind, right? That this is a system that's never loved our people. But now we're trying to bring some of that love back, right? So I think about that quite a bit. But to the point of how to do this and arriving at a point in grade 11 where this might be the first time these stories are in front of young people, I think we really need to have a good gut check around that as teachers because we have our responsibility as Kira has talked to what before. And ultimately that responsibility for educators is policy. And there's been a policy called the curriculum and social studies and history as well as other curricular revisions where we see these opportunities to bring in our stories. And I get sad when we only look at this from a historical or a social studies lens to it's upsetting to me that we aren't demonstrating our brilliance or whether or not there aren't the same opportunities to demonstrate our brilliance across all disciplines in the sciences and the mathematics and even physical education. And so I think a lot about that in the implementation, but I do think we have to recognize that there is an expectation that we do this work. At the same point, with high expectations needs to come high supports, right? And so I often think about that too and what are the opportunities that we're taking up as educators to engage in the learning? Nicole, I know your team provides a tremendous amount of learning for educators. We just need to know where to access it. Really that's really what it comes down to. But those opportunities are there and let me tell you, you know, even in mainstream places like Indico, you can't walk by the first set of racks without seeing an indigenous section now. And if you walk by that before, I would encourage you to maybe stop and have a peek and pick up a couple of those books. I say that for a few reasons. And I think it's important for us as learners, as adults, but also for young people. When we think about the stories we share in classrooms, we can't be sharing all the stories of trauma. All the really, really difficult things that have happened to us, those are important. But I always say for every story of trauma and difficult moments, we tell we need to be telling two stories of resistance, hope and resurgence. Because for young people, you know, I look back at my educational career and I'm looking at Kayla right now on the screen and I'm thinking I would have loved to have heard more than the fact that our people were demonstrating on a highway. I would have loved to heard more. I didn't even hear about residential schools. I would have loved to have done more than build popsicle longhouses. I think we're beyond that now. I really do. But what I'm saying is that there's a complexity to our people and it's not just our traumas that we need to be sharing today. And so, you know, for me, I often think about my own kids, right? So how we position that learning, right, to go back to the implementation of the how. I always say that, you know, when the learning's all said and done, we know it's not, but for the purposes of that grade. I don't want students and my daughter's class to look over at them and see pity and weakness and feel sorry for them. What I want them to see is the strength, pride, the resistance, the ongoing resilience that's happening in our family. So I think those are some of the things I consider. But I also, you know, when I think about the how we implement, I go back to some of the work that Pamela Toulouse has done around holistic education. And I absolutely love. There's a visual I wish I could share it. I know this is a podcast, but it's one that I often use to talk about how do we, how do we begin to infuse that love that I spoke about before? Love back into a system that's never loved us. And I think it starts with everybody can see themselves in this administrators, you know, system people like superintendents and directors, but also educators. You know, when we think about a young indigenous person or a classroom, what do we need to surround them with? What do we need to wrap them up with that's going to promote their success in that classroom? I think number one is we need to be engaged with families. So when we're doing this work, we need to be engaged with families. Number two, Pamela Toulouse talks about as well. When again, when we want to do this work in an authentic way, it needs to be connected to community. It needs to be connected to community for a variety of reasons, a couple that I've already stated, which is to bring our to hear it from us first. So it's authentic and real. It comes to us. But also what it does for our young people and what it would have done for me is that it shows me, it shows someone who is like me, sharing our knowledge is back. And that's that pride piece that we're talking about. The third thing she says that we need to provide for young people is the fact that we need to have educators, like we've been talking about, that are compassionate, that are empathetic, that are knowledgeable, that have done the learning. Wrap those kids with that. And the last thing and I'm so happy, Kira spoke about it earlier. And this isn't just an indigenous thing. This is for all kids, is that we need to have them experiencing connections to the land when they're doing this learning. That's not an indigenous thing. Look at the situation we find ourselves in today. If only we understood our responsibilities within that beautiful web of creation. We'd be in a lot better place. And I'll tell you, again, that's necessary for our people. It's darn good for all. And I think we got to get back to some of those pieces. So, and sorry, and the last thing I want to say too, I built the implementation of this, is, you know, I often hear the weight of this, right? The weight of, I'm still doing the learning, still doing the learning. And I fully agree with what Kira has said, right, that there's going to be mistakes. There's going to be mistakes. And we want to ensure that those mistakes are minor, are not even a good word. But those mistakes don't have lasting impacts on young people. And so we have to do, you know, we really have to do the learning. But one of the beautiful things about this is if we're using authentic people and we're using authentic indigenous resources, one of the weights that we can lift off of our Chess as educators, is that we can lean on one of the most decolonized pedagogies we have in our toolbox today. And it's called inquiry. And if we jump right alongside the students with good, and we do our work, we do our learning, but we provide good-vetted resources in front of them that come from indigenous education teams like the coal, you folks do that work at vetting and looking at resources and providing lists. When we do that, we release ourselves at the burden to know all. And to know that it's coming from a good place and an innovative place. So, you know, utilize inquiry and not just in the social studies, utilize it across multiple disciplines. So, again, not to get right down to the particulars of in the classroom, but I think there's some ideas that I hope folks can draw from that think about the how, how do we do this? Yeah. Thanks. And I think we should go to the resource teachers who have been working with educators and have kind of seen what's been happening in school. Kind of like piggyback on all of that and say, you know, both as like a teacher educator. And now as, you know, a resource teacher and going out and supporting indigenous students, which is part of what I'm doing right now. What I'm seeing is it's not even, it's not even enough. I'm, when Kayla says like this is the first time she's seeing any indigenous content in what she's learning. And so there hasn't been room for harm because nothing's been done. But I want to kind of counter that because, you know, I'm supporting a lot of students who I see are being harmed very much by that lack of content and by the fact that they don't see themselves at all in the curriculum. And they're not buying into the educational system because it's irrelevant for them. And they are being harmed in a very big way. And so I think, you know, when we talk about the learning that teachers need to do, I, more and more, I mean, I don't know how we do this, you know, but there needs to be expectations put in place. And I know there are, but I think those expectations need to be really implemented and school boards need to really be serious about their commitment to indigenous education and to the well-being of indigenous students because it's not okay at this point in time to not be implementing anything in your classroom to not be engaging with indigenous learning and ways of knowing and to just be apathetic or to say, I don't know what to do. Then you need to do the learning. And it's really, you know, it's up to each individual, like, you know, as Kira was saying, we have responsibilities. And as teachers and as educators, we have a real responsibility to uphold the rights of indigenous students. But school boards also have the responsibility to ensure that teachers are meeting their responsibilities as educators and that indigenous students are not being harmed by erasure because that's still what's happening. So, you know, we have to keep doing what we're doing. And on the positive note, I want to say, you know, I just posted on Twitter, I think this morning, yesterday this morning, I don't know, that it was so great to see teachers bringing in treaty education into their classrooms. And I've spoken to a few teachers over the last few days who are really doing the learning number one and then bringing that into their classrooms. Even with, you know, little kids like grade one's grade two's, you know, they're learning about treaties. And, you know, I've had teachers contact me and I've had conversations with teachers asking, you know, I want to do this. Is this good? And it's wonderful. So on a positive note, I want to say there are teachers out there who are really taking those responsibilities seriously, but I really feel school boards need to do more to ensure that every teacher is meeting those responsibilities and meeting their obligations to indigenous rights and ensuring that indigenous students are having a successful experience in school and not being harmed. Absolutely. If I could jump in as well, Jane and Kayla, then please jump in. But it was something that Nick said and then Jane really took up for me of thinking about, how is it that we are wrapping our students in this care and as Jane really invites us to do what is the intention? And something that I've been sitting with and haven't really made the connection to until now is I'm seven months pregnant expecting first baby. And so it's been a really exciting time to think about my baby bundle as so many indigenous mothers and indigenous families are working on the gathering of resources of knowledge and of that intentional space of when baby makes their spirit journey here. How am I going to welcome them here and let them know your home now and you will be taking care of. And it's a physical bundle of how am I going to provide for them in terms of nourishment and their needs and their intellectual development. But it's very much grounded in honoring of spirit as well. And so some of it's very tangible of medicines and blankets, but some of it is also just as practical and purposeful, though it can't be touched of my own learning and attention to Mohawk language of how am I going to be able to make sure I can speak to baby and know my Mohawk lullaby and create that care. And so what might it look like to create these student bundles of source of being so intentional with our classroom spaces of how am I going to attend a spirit. It may be it is physical of these resources that we do put together, but what about their nourishment and how are we going to send them along their ways and let them know not only you are home and you are cared for here. But but that I see you. I've been expecting you and it's been it I've done my homework and you're you're here now and that's my responsibility. I'd love to add if I can have a chance to. I love how you mention being like trying to raise indigenous children in an environment in which they can see their culture represented. I'm pretty lucky that my mom amazing she's so great raised me very well with a lot of indigenous teachings and being able to experience that culture from a young age. But I also do know that through that knowing all of these facts and history of indigenous people from a young age makes it even more impactful to not see that represented correctly in the education system. And I think one instance that I particularly want to mention and get your guys' opinions on to is specific days and months of representation such as indigenous history month or truth and reconciliation like the day in particular. Because I know that from my experience I absolutely love that that time is dedicated to teach and to have everyone learn and be immersed in this history and learning and understanding. But it also does feel a little bit disingenuous sometimes when it's not represented throughout the school year and then all of a sudden because it's November I believe now it's super important to be learning these things. I just think that it's an interesting contrast there between the rest of the year. And also just one little thing that I wanted to add to from I believe what Nick might have said is currently we're trying to come back into the education system and bring indigenous beliefs and teachings back into the indigenous or sorry back into the school system. But one thing that was actually mentioned in the book and unreconciled is that reconciliation is really difficult because the definition of "breconcil" is to bring back a relationship to fix what was there. But we never had a relationship with the school system. We never had a relationship with I guess modern European peoples before colonization. And so it's really hard to try and reconcile what was never there in the first place. So right now we're trying to build the system and make something that wasn't there before which is just an interesting thought that I noticed between the book and what has been said so far. Yeah, I'm going to comment on that because being in this new position, this resource teacher position, we, Jane and I get to be on the front lines. We get to go into schools and we get to see things like this. And we're sitting in a school right now that I was a big part of. And looking around, I can see huge representation on the walls. There's a tapestry of missing and murdered indigenous women, baseless dolls. There's a whole section of NBE3C and NBE3 novels that I'm looking at right now. So I know that some schools are doing it. But I do want to touch on that reconciliation piece and I want to connect it to what Jane and said about admit, not admit, but she's talked about the school board. But I'm going to go even like more micro and talk about administration in some schools. We're still in 2022 and I say this like I should be surprised by this but I'm really not surprised by this. We're still running into problems with administration who are hesitant to bring in indigenous quarantine. And for the most part, we see there'll be a core, like for example, this podcast, this podcast will be listened to people that are already invested in indigenous education for the most part, right? The people that are going to be hearing this are going to understand it and the people that don't want to hear it or don't understand it will maybe turn it off after 30 seconds because they don't get it. And we find that we're running into the same problems with administrators that don't get it, that this is an agenda to them, right? Our agenda is that we want to bring in indigenous aspects for education that are really only particular to a small group of individuals. So when Kayla talks about how this NBE course is, like this is the first kind of real impact of indigenous education that she's had and a focused one is that's because we in this board especially we have a really small population of indigenous students. So when I do my job, I'm looking not only at indigenous students but I'm also looking at students and how to get them invested in indigenous education or indigenous ideas or whatever it is because that to me is hitting on those particular points of the TRC, right? That's 62, 63, 64. And if we don't do that and we just kind of tailor everything to indigenous students, especially like I said in this board, then we're missing an opportunity to decolonize everybody, right? So I guess my question is that how I have two questions, how do we get administrators to kind of sign on to this and be committed when they just don't, they're either too big to understand or they've done too much or they just are set in their ways or they don't see the need of it. And then how do we get those teachers that aren't invested? How do we get them invested? Because I know that a lot of teachers coming out of teachers college now do have this education, right? I know Kira does a great job because my daughter tells me that she's in that indigenous teachers cohort. She tells me all the time that she's learning so much that she never even knew and she's not out of high school that long. So how do we get those teachers that aren't invested to sign on to this thing and how do we get administrators to sign on? So that students like Kayla don't have to wait until grade 11 to get that indigenous content. Can I add on to your question there, David is in listening to what Kayla's brought up is that fear of mistakes, that the reality of not even the mistakes that are in the place in the harm that's caused for them, but it talked about the absence is like risk management, right? If I just don't have it there, then risk management's in place. And to what David is saying, how do you know moving beyond the mandated approach to like yes, we know the policy and the curriculum, like it's mandated, like how long do we have to hide behind this like risk management of keeping it, you know, if I don't bring it into the space, I can't make the mistake in the harm kind of approach to teaching. And not only how do we get people on board is what you know, David's asking in terms of it men, but how do we get people to understand that this absence of this approach of risk management is active your Asia, it is harmful and it is upholding. And even at sometimes strengthening colonialism when we're here to dismantle. So it's both of those pieces, is it adding it or is it really seeing it for what it's worth, like what it's actually is? I can jump in. I've got a few thoughts around all around all of this. You know, for me, the movement needs to start at the top. So I'm going to be, we all need to understand how the education system works, right? Like we've got elected people who are trustees who kind of set the tone, set the big broad priorities, then we have an operational side, right, which is the director, superintendents, everybody right down to the student in the classroom, right? So we have to understand how those pieces all work together. And all of this is about value in. If it's not valued at those levels, we're going to see the disconnect, right down to Kayla's experience in the classroom. And so with that, you know, we can do all the PD that we want. We can do all the PD that we want. But until there is a strategic direction that says right from the top, this is what we're going to be looking to achieve. That's how this institution works. You know, we're in it. We have to call it what it is. It works as a top down approach. It's hierarchy. And yeah, we want to decolonize that. But the reality is that's the system that we're in right now, right? We can't, we can't devoid that reality. So we need to see that work being done with the trustees. What are the opportunities that they have? But then because what that does is it promotes that possibility for a multi-year plan, which is what there, that's like a trustee sort of, you know, the big bolts, right? What it is they want to achieve over there for five year mandate with the director, that needs to be there. It needs to have its presence and be up front. And so I know there's lots of boards who have a pillar in their multi-year strategic plan that talks about truth and reconciliation. Move over to the operational side. What that does that is it says thou shalt as a superintendent. That is part of your marching orders. Where does that go then? Right down to the principal who says, oh, I need to put this in my, well, it's in the BIPSA. It's in the board improvement plan. I should have that in my school improvement plan and then so on and so forth. And those wheels get turning. I don't love that. But what there is with that is there's accountability. And that's the one thing that we're missing in this conversation is that we, we can talk about responsibilities, but we're also in a colonial institution where there is accountability. And we need to have these colonial tools like policies that keep us accountable. We can rely on relationships, but goodwill can only take us so far. And so I'm a big believer in that. So that's the policy side. But in terms of the decolonizing pieces, I think we also need to have a real strong check of what it is we're talking about when we say the words decolonizing education. But to decolonize education is what Kayla talked about before. That's a reclamation of our own system. How we would do it, right? That to me is the decolonized system. So what we're doing in education then is not, I don't think we're not in there yet. What we're talking about is decolonizing practices in education. What are the things we can do to tinker with that system and Marie the teaspoon captured it so beautifully for me once where she said Nick. She said decolonization is two separate, there's two pieces to it. Number one, she said there's the system that's there that's all held up by all that here horrible stuff, headgemon, hierarchy, all those things, right? Power and privilege. And she said, what we need to do is we need to dismantle that. We need to deconstruct that system at play. How do you do that? We do single time in our classrooms, we teach about treaty every single time we call a racer out every single time that we have policies that protect indigenous youth and we do the education. All these things, that's like taking all these pins out of this system that hold it together and then boom, it comes down. But then we have the responsibility to build something different in the state, right? So when we think about decolonization, when we think about where we're at, I really think we need to be using the words decolonizing practices because that's what we're doing right now. Full-fledged decolonization means we're going to live up to treaty, we're not even having this conversation because we're going to have our own systems, right? So in education, we're doing decolonizing practices. And by the way, the other word I learned this past year was a word un-colonizing. I'm like, what's that all about? What's this un-colonizing stuff? And that's for the work of non-indigenous people. What is the work that you need to be doing in that deconstruction as well? Where you are actively disengaging from those colonial procedures. You're detaching yourself from what is almost inherent, we just do it because we do it because it's how we've done it for years. That's what Marie Batisse talks about. We're marinated in colonialism. We don't even know, right? But every time we detach ourselves from that hierarchy, every time we detach ourselves from those half-truths and see the whole truth, that's un-colonizing and that works towards the greater cause of potentially building something new. So I'm going to stop there. Nick, I want to ask, I don't want to comment on that, but I also want to ask you a question because you talked about policy at the beginning of your statement that we have to do it with this top-down aspect towards education, that we have to do policy and then get in with that framework and then we can move on, right? So I have two common/questions about that. Maybe you can, anybody can jump in on these. The first part of that is that seems like to me a colonization of decolonization. We have to go and do, jump through those hoops that the man has said to us for so long if we want, it's almost like we got to play that game, right? That we're going to break the system down or how I always say it, we should set it on fire. But like if we're going to break the system down, we have to do it from the inside is what I'm getting for you. And then the second thing is I want to go back to what you talked about really early on about the sovereignty of Indigenous education and how we need to take that back and be masters of our own domain and that we have to look out for ourselves and be able to build systems, I hate that word, but build systems of education that are largely Indigenous-founded, Indigenous-run and under like that Indigenous pedagogy, right? So, but then if we're never allowed to do that and we have to follow policy all the time to get forward, then how does it change? I don't mean to be pessimistic here, but I sometimes am pessimistic when it comes to education. So when I, in a classroom with Kira, I'm vastly aware that I'm in a colonial institution taking Indigenous pedagogy and the irony of that is not lost on me, right? So I understand, again, I want to reiterate that I understand that that policy is built on a colonial system and that if we want to break down that colonial system, we have to do it from within a colonial system, is that correct? Until we realize treaty, I think it's an unfortunate reality from my perspective that I see is that I think I wrote in a chat, we need to use these colonial tools for the system to help to break it down and it's unfortunate, but what I do think is possible, right, is the decolonized practice of how that would come about. That policy would be written by and with Indigenous people. The instruction about how to go about it would be done and that's kind of that self-determining piece and again, realizing the right space pieces, right, that we should be saying these things for ourselves, not anybody else for us. So I think that, like I say, I'm in agreement that there's a two frames here, right? We tinker with what we have, we burn it down and start something new. I don't know that we, I think we already have glimpses of what it could and should be, like I'm thinking about some of the programs at Six Nations, like they're there, they're happening. We have the models, but in this system, again, wasn't designed by us and was designed for us, I think that we're kind of locked into it. And until we realize the big picture of treaty, which is we get the right to then determine here and we can fund our own systems and not just through, not just through the Indian Act, that type of stuff. I think we have a very different opportunity then, but from what I've seen, the big vast movement has been using colonial tools within a colonial system, but it's by Indigenous people. And then it helps to, again, break that system down. And that's what I think we're doing is we're really locked into breaking down things right now. I don't think we're in a scenario creating something new and distinct yet. We're breaking it down. And at the same time, these policies too, I look at them from a harm reduction perspective too, we're trying to do things so that folks like Kayla don't experience those things in a classroom that we know will go on, right? So we're, I think there's harm reduction volunteers as well. Yeah, I had to really think about that one, David, because I hate to admit it, but that's for my thinking is right now. I'm just speaking as an Indigenous parent who has kids in not the school board, but a school board with an amazing Indigenous education team. And I know that they're doing amazing work. But the accountability isn't there because my kids are still coming home with long houses and it was a paper long house, not popsicle stick, but long houses in their backpack or oppressive assignments that center the fact that everybody immigrated to Canada. And you know, there was no one here before. So I think that when we kind of work the system or kind of use tools that the system can understand in order for that harm reduction, as long as it's Indigenous lead and driven by Indigenous voices, I think that can have a huge impact. As we approach our one hour mark here, I just wanted to, I think really seek to consolidate these conversations and the really robust questions we've had by just turning to our expert here of being Kayla. And I think it's just really reflecting on what is it that you wish that you wish your teachers knew, Kayla. So I did answer this question last time. I'm not sure if I should have a different answer or you can answer it again. Okay. Well, then I suppose it might be a little bit repetitive for some of the others in the call, but for Nick and Kier who I have not shared this with yet. I don't have it right on me. So I'm going to reiterate what I said. But a little while ago, I wrote like a little passage essentially of what I had wished that my teachers knew. I'm related to the podcast just in general. And well, I don't have that word forward here. Essentially what I had said is that I really wish that in schools and just in general that teachers had thought more about teaching the beauty and the amazing elements of indigenous culture and of other BIPOC cultures. Because while it is super, super important to talk about and acknowledge all of the harm and struggles that these people have experienced, it is also really important to acknowledge the resilience and the strength of these cultures. And I find that that hasn't been done very much in my experience with the school board and with the education system. And another thing that I led with is I really wish that sometimes more thought was put into what was being shared and making sure that students understood the significance of what was being shared instead of just showing videos of how I was for kids to laugh at and calling it representation in the education system. The podcast. So we can't see people's reactions on the screen. But we felt that Kayla. So I think we're out of time. I'd like to thank Kira and Nick for joining us. I was this conversation is so important. And I can't wait to listen back over and over again. So Nyaawata, both if you want to say some closing things open it up to you. No all say is just a beautiful way to start this morning. And as we really start to appreciate the sunshine and transitioning weather towards spring, it's just a just a lovely time to really be rejuvenated with the land and through these conversations. And man, what a change in conversation that we've seen in the last few years of what it meant for my mom, for my grandma, for my great grandma to be a Mohawk woman and to be a Mohawk teacher and Mohawk educator and my goodness to be part of these conversations now and so it's an unbelievable privilege. Absolutely. What a path we're on. We need to always pause and look back and see where we come from and consider that and celebrate some of those pieces but also to think about where we're going because there's lots of work to be done. I guess I know that our, you know, we've kind of talked a little bit about reconciliation with all this. I guess my last words would be and I would, I'm going to steal some words from my good bud, Kevin Lamaral at the University of Manitoba. And I want to remind everyone that, you know, the only reason we have the possibility for reconciliation is because of the strength of all the survivors who came and told their stories. So, you know, put that in, like when we talk about love and compassion, put that into our hearts that the people who are hurt most are given us this chance in education to make it right. So that would be my closing words as we always have to think about where this come, where this came from, this great opportunity. And of course, on the shoulders of many, many folks before that, we're a commission on it, of Aboriginal people, Indian brothers, and all that work that's been done throughout in education. We lift them up and we know that it's our people who are going to help us lead the way through all this and can't give up on that. Thank you for listening to Article 14. We invite you to continue the conversation on social media using the hashtag pdsb on reconciled. Next time on Article 14, and you know, because once you know who you are, especially as you know as settler, then that word, you know, becomes something different. And not only that, then you can relate to indigenous peoples in very, very, again, like, you know, ways that intersect. Your hosts for Article 14 are Jane Ann Gibson, David Badpock, Allison Cunningham, and Nicole Reynolds. Music is by Zoe Roy, produced by Hobbits. To buy a copy of Jesse Wenton's book on reconciled. Go to bidmines.com.