CBC News published May 28, 2021: Remains of 215 children found at former B.C. residential school, First Nation says. Tk’emlups te Secwépemc Chief Rosanne Casimir says that preliminary findings from a survey of the grounds at the former Kamloops Indian Residential school have uncovered the remains of 215 children.
CBC News: The National published May 28, 2021: Remains of 215 children reportedly found on grounds of B.C. residential school. A B.C. First Nation believes it has found the remains of over 200 Indigenous children at the former site of the Kamloops Indian Residential School. It housed hundreds of Indigenous children over eight decades.
The remains of about 215 children were discovered buried at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia, Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Kukpi Chief Rosanne Casimir.
— Global Awareness 101 (@Mononoke__Hime) June 10, 2021
School meant for First Nations students in Canada. [5/29/21]
https://t.co/BmMuRUOKRX
What I find interesting is that the tribe isn't revealing the exact location of this discovery. Chief Casimir said ground penetrating radar was used to locate the site. BUT no access was given to images showing what was found OR how it was analyzed. This Canadian government-sponsored Indian Residential Schools was run (meaning managed) by the Catholic church 1890 to 1969. Then the Canadian federal government took it over until it closed in 1978. Our own US Child Protective Services and Welfare system are worse than these Canadian Indian Residential Schools which operated much like a government funded orphanage. CPS are trafficking low-income children to pedophiles for profit. (emphasis mine)
The Washington Examiner
written by Mike Brest, Breaking News Reporter
Saturday May 29, 2021
The remains of about 215 children were discovered buried near a school meant for First Nations students in Canada.
With the help of ground-penetrating radar technology, the remains were discovered at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia, Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Kukpi Chief Rosanne Casimir announced Thursday.
“We had a knowing in our community that we were able to verify. To our knowledge, these missing children are undocumented deaths,” Casimir said in a statement. “Some were as young as three years old. We sought out a way to confirm that knowing out of deepest respect and love for those lost children and their families, understanding that Tk’emlups te Secwepemc is the final resting place of these children.”
Lisa Lapointe, the chief coroner of British Columbia, said: “We are early in the process of gathering information and will continue to work collaboratively with the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc and others as this sensitive work progresses.”
“We recognize the tragic, heartbreaking devastation that the Canadian residential school system has inflicted upon so many, and our thoughts are with all of those who are in mourning today,” she added.
Nearly 150,000 First Nations children living in Canada from 1883 to 1996 were often forced into government-funded, church-run schools that worked to assimilate them, according to the Washington Post. Many of those students never returned home.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has identified the names of, or information about, more than 4,100 children who died while attending a residential school.
I added these pictures above to the message below.
[source: The Canadian Encyclopedia]
Residential schools were government-sponsored religious schools that were established to assimilate Indigenous children into Euro-Canadian culture. Although the first residential facilities were established in New France, the term usually refers to schools established after 1880. Residential schools were created by Christian churches and the Canadian government as an attempt to both educate and convert Indigenous youth and to assimilate them into Canadian society. However, the schools disrupted lives and communities, causing long-term problems among Indigenous peoples. The last residential school closed in 1996. (Grollier Hall, which closed in 1997, was not a state-run residential school in that year.) Since then, former students have demanded recognition and restitution, resulting in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement in 2007 and a formal public apology by Prime Minister Stephen Harper in 2008. In total, an estimated 150,000 First Nation, Inuit, and Métis children attended residential schools.
Early Residential Schools in New France and Upper Canada
Residential schools have a long history in Canada. The first residential facilities were developed in New France by Catholic missionaries to provide care and schooling. However, colonial governments were unable to force Indigenous people to participate in the schools, as First Nations people were largely independent and Europeans depended on them economically and militarily for survival.
However, residential schools became part of government and church policy from the 1830s on, with the creation of Anglican, Methodist, and Roman Catholic institutions in Upper Canada (Ontario). The oldest continually operating residential school in Canada was the Mohawk Institute in what is now Brantford, Ontario. This began as a day school for Six Nations boys, but in 1831 it started to accept boarding students. These colonial experiments set the pattern for post-Confederation policies.
Residential Schools After 1880
Beginning in the 1870s, both the federal government and Plains Nations wanted to include schooling provisions in treaties, though for different reasons. Indigenous leaders hoped Euro-Canadian schooling would help their young to learn the skills of the newcomer society and help them make a successful transition to a world dominated by the strangers. With the passage of the British North America Act in 1867, and the implementation of the Indian Act (1876), the government was required to provide Indigenous youth with an education and to assimilate them into Canadian society.
The federal government supported schooling as a way to make First Nations economically self-sufficient. Their underlying objective was to decrease Indigenous dependence on public funds. The government therefore collaborated with Christian missionaries to encourage religious conversion and Indigenous economic self-sufficiency. This led to the development of an educational policy after 1880 that relied heavily on custodial schools. These were not the kind of schools Indigenous leaders had hoped to create.
Beginning with the establishment of three industrial schools on the prairies in 1883, and through the next half-century, the federal government and churches developed a system of residential schools that stretched across much of the country. Most of the residential schools were in the four Western provinces and the territories, but there were also significant numbers in northwestern Ontario and in northern Québec. New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island had no schools, apparently because the government assumed that Indigenous people there had been assimilated into Euro-Canadian culture.
At its height around 1930, the residential school system totalled 80 institutions. The Roman Catholic Church operated three-fifths of the schools, the Anglican Church one-quarter and the United and Presbyterian Churches the remainder. (Before 1925, the Methodist Church also operated residential schools; however, when the United Church of Canada was formed in 1925, most of the Presbyterian and all the Methodist schools became United Church schools.)
Life at Residential Schools
Until the late 1950s, residential schools operated on a half-day system, in which students spent half the day in the classroom and the other at work. The theory behind this was that students would learn skills that would allow them to earn a living as adults. However, the reality was that work had more to do with running the school inexpensively than with providing students with vocational training.
Tasks were separated by gender. Girls were responsible for housekeeping (cooking, cleaning, laundry, sewing), while boys were involved in carpentry, construction, general maintenance and agricultural labour. Funding was a pressing concern in the residential school system. From the 1890s until the 1950s, the government tried constantly to shift the burden of the system onto the churches and onto the students, whose labour contributed financially to the schools. By the 1940s, it was clear to many that the half-day system had failed to provide residential students with adequate education and training. However, the half-day system was not eliminated until the late 1950s, when more funding became available owing to a strong economy.
Abuse at Residential Schools
Many students suffered abuse at residential schools. Impatience and correction often led to excessive punishment, including physical abuse. In some cases, children were heavily beaten, chained or confined.
Some of the staff were sexual predators, and many students were sexually abused. When allegations of sexual abuse were brought forward — by students, parents or staff — the response by government and church officials was, at best, inadequate. The police were seldom contacted, and, even if government or church officials decided that the complaint had merit, the response was often simply to fire the perpetrator. At other times, they allowed the abuser to keep teaching.
Health, Death and Disease at Residential Schools
According to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), at least 3,200 Indigenous children died in the overcrowded residential schools. Due to poor record-keeping by the churches and federal government, it is unlikely that we will ever know the total loss of life at residential schools. However, according to TRC Chair, Justice Murray Sinclair, the number may be more than 6,000.
In May of 2021, results from a ground survey at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in Kamloops, BC, uncovered the remains of 215 children buried at the site. The nearby Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation had hired a team of specialists using ground-penetrating radar to find the remains. Chief Rosanne Casimir said that the process of identifying the children’s remains has been ongoing since the early 2000s. A recent grant from BC’s Pathway to Healing program provided the funding for the ground-penetrating radar technology.
In operation by the Catholic Church from 1890 to 1969, the Kamloops Indian Residential School reported having up to 500 children registered each year, according to the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR). The 2008 TRC was told that only 50 deaths had occurred at the institution. The school officially closed in 1978 after the federal government took over control in 1969.
In 2005, the federal government established a $1.9 billion compensation package for the survivors of abuse at residential schools. In 2007, the federal government and the churches that had operated the schools agreed to provide financial compensation to former students under the Residential Schools Settlement Agreement.
Harper’s apology and the compensation packages offered by the federal government excluded survivors of residential schools in Newfoundland and Labrador. Since Canada did not establish or operate residential schools in that province (Newfoundland was not part of Canada at the time the schools began operating), the federal government argued that it was not responsible for compensating former students. After survivors launched a class-action lawsuit against the government, a settlement of $50 million was reached on 10 May 2016. The settlement was approved by Newfoundland and Labrador Supreme Court Justice Robert Stack on 28 September 2016.On 24 November 2017, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau formally apologized to survivors of residential schools in Newfoundland and Labrador.
No comments:
Post a Comment