Actions and Commitments: Call to Action # 75
Exploring Theme: "Commitments to Residential Schools"
Updates on this page: 33
April 16, 2024
Budget 2024: Addressing the Legacy of Residential Schools
Residential school denialism has severe impacts on Survivors and descendants of Survivors. Such denialism seeks to erase the ongoing trauma and harm that Indigenous Peoples continue to face because of the legacy of residential schools. It further burdens Survivors and their descendants, whose mental health, well-being, and economic opportunities are still hampered today by thisshameful...
July 31, 2023
Ontario Launching New Indian Residential School Community Engagement Fund
New fund supporting ongoing burial investigations and mental health supports NationTalk: TORONTO – The Ontario government is continuing to take action to support Indigenous communities in the province by launching the $7.1 million Indian Residential School Community Engagement Fund (IRSCEF). The new fund will enable additional communities and organizations to support Survivors and their families...
February 17, 2023
International Commission on Missing Persons to undertake outreach and engagement sessions with Indigenous communities on unmarked burial sites
Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada: Taking care: We recognize this news release may contain information that is difficult for many and that our efforts to honour Survivors and families may act as an unwelcome reminder for those who have suffered hardships through generations of government policies that were harmful to Indigenous Peoples. The National...
February 7, 2023
Ottawa spending $2-million for international commission to offer advice on unmarked graves
The Globe and Mail: Ottawa is spending $2 million for an international organization to provide Indigenous communities with options for identifying possible human remains buried near former residential school sites. The office of Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Marc Miller said in a statement Tuesday it is signing a technical agreement with the International Commission on Missing...
November 29, 2022
ISN Maskwa and Narratives Inc. Partner on Residential Schools Investigation
NationTalk: Missanabie Cree First Nation, through its company ISN Maskwa, announced a partnership with Narratives Inc. as Survivors and their families continue to seek truth, justice, and healing. By working together, the two organizations can provide highly specialized and strong technical supports to Survivors and communities, who are currently undertaking the important work of searching...
October 26, 2022
GNWT releases report on history of NWT education facilities including residential schools, day schools and residences
To support the work of reconciliation and healing within Indigenous communities, the Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT) has released a report that provides a summary of educational facilities, including residential schools, day schools and residences, in the Northwest Territories (NWT) from 1862 to 2021. Sorting information by community, the Report on the History of NWT...
October 21, 2022
First Nations, governments sign memorandum of understanding for Bringing Our Children Home initiative
Initiative searching for missing children who attended Pelican Lake Indian Residential School CBC: An initiative aimed at locating missing children who attended Pelican Lake Indian Residential School took a step forward this week, with First Nations and government signing a memorandum of understanding in Thunder Bay, Ont. The Bikiiwewinig Nindawaashishiiminaanak Initiative, or Bringing Our Children...
June 15, 2022
Manitoba Government allocates $2.5 Million for the Identification, Commemoration and Protection of Burial Sites of Children Who Attended Residential Schools
NationTalk: The Manitoba government and the First Nations, Inuit and Red River Métis Council on Residential Schools is allocating $2.5 million to Indigenous governments and organizations to co-develop Indigenous-led approaches to find and memorialize missing children and promote collective healing and reconciliatory action, Premier Heather Stefanson and Indigenous Reconciliation and Northern Relations Minister Alan Lagimodiere...
May 17, 2022
Govt of Canada update on actions to help Indigenous communities to respond to and heal from impacts of residential schools
Crown and Indigenous Services Canada and Northern Affairs Canada : On May 16: the Honourable Marc Miller, Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations; the Honourable Patty Hajdu, Minister of Indigenous Services; the Honourable Pablo Rodriguez, Minister of Canadian Heritage; the Honourable David Lametti, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada; the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of...
March 23, 2022
$2.5M in funding to Indigenous communities
Govt. of Manitoba – The Manitoba government has committed $2.5 million to support the identification, investigation, protection and commemoration of the children who died attending residential schools. To date, the Government of Canada has provided $3.9 million to Indigenous communities within Manitoba. As of December 2021, six First Nation communities in Manitoba are actively carrying out...
November 9, 2021
Mohawk Institute begins search for unmarked graves
Mohawk Institute – The search for unmarked graves at the former Mohawk Institute in Brantford, Ontario has begun. The Joint Police Task Force began their work this morning by combing the search grid with the use of ground-penetrating radar technology....
October 29, 2021
IRS Survivor Support Funding
Government of Ontario is funding over $20 million in Indigenous-focused mental health and addictions programs and services to directly support Indian residential school survivors. The funding will ensure culturally appropriate, trauma-informed supports are available to both First Nations and urban Indigenous organizations as critical work is undertaken to investigate and commemorate former Indian residential school...
October 26, 2021
Heritage Preservation Partnership Program: IRS Support Funding
EverythingGP – Each of the nine has received $30,000 from the provincial government following a funding commitment earlier this year through the Heritage Preservation Partnership Program. Much of it is also being done in partnership with the Institute of Prairie and Indigenous Archaeology (IPIA) at the University of Alberta, and led by Dr. Kisha Supernant. According...
August 30, 2021
Call for museums, archives and “other institutions” to make records of the schools available to First Nations communities
Toronto Star – After committing to investigate the history of New Brunswick’s infamous day schools for Indigenous children, the New Brunswick government is now calling on the province’s museum, archives and “other institutions” to make records of the schools available to First Nations communities. The records include those on the little-known Sussex Vale Indian Day School,...
August 16, 2021
Mohawk Institute creating a Survivors’ Secretariat
Mohawk Institute is creating a Survivors’ Secretariat to commence a death/criminal investigation. The Mandate of the Survivors’ Secretariat includes coordinating death investigation processes and protocols, conducting Statement Gathering, document collection and historical research, supporting commemoration initiatives, and liaising with First Nations, provincial, and federal governments. The Survivors’ Secretariat is currently working to put in place...
August 5, 2021
B.C. residential school response fund
First Nations with former Indian Residential School and Indian Hospital sites in or near their communities can now access the B.C. residential school response fund with the added support of two newly appointed First Nations liaisons. The B.C. government has appointed Charlene Belleau (herself a residential school survivor) and Lydia Hwitsum as First Nations liaisons,...
July 20, 2021
Criteria for B.C. residential school response fund
B.C. residential school response fund is available to support activities on the sites of former Indian Residential Schools and Indian Hospitals. Up to $475,000 is available for each site. Funding is available for: Mental health and wellness and clinical supports Traditional wellness and cultural supports Archival research Engagement with Elders, knowledge-keepers, survivors, intergenerational survivors and...
July 19, 2021
Mohawk Institute: investments for “Save the Evidence” project
The Government of Canada is investing over $7.6 million in the “Save the Evidence” project through the Community, Culture and Recreation Infrastructure Stream of the Investing in Canada plan. The Government of Ontario is providing more than $1.8 million, while the Woodland Cultural Centre is contributing $378,437. The work will allow the Woodland Cultural Centre...
June 24, 2021
Commitment to Indigenous leaders around unmarked graves in province
VOCM – Premier Andrew Furey says government will support whatever plan Indigenous leaders come up with regarding unmarked burial sites in the province. Furey says once the leaders come to a consensus on the approach they want to take, government will be there to support it, whether it’s financial, emotional, or in the form of...
June 23, 2021
Alberta Residential Schools Community Research Grant
Alberta’s government is providing $8 million to fund the Alberta Residential Schools Community Research Grant that is open to Indigenous communities and groups that will lead the research into undocumented deaths and burials in residential schools. Grant funding will be available to Indigenous communities and organizations for the following purposes: Community-driven research, including gathering oral...
June 21, 2021
Funding for ‘identification, investigation, protection and commemoration’ of residential school burial sites
Toronto Star – Ontario government “has committed $10M over the next three years on the ‘identification, investigation, protection and commemoration’ of residential school burial sites across the province…The TRC working group on missing children and unmarked burials identified 12 residential school burial sites ‘with varying degrees of certainty’ before completing their work in 2015. The...
June 14, 2021
Statement from Yukon Premier
June 24, 2021 – “We stand in solidarity with Yukon First Nations and Indigenous Canadians through this difficult time. These painful discoveries must drive necessary conversations about Canada’s dark history. More importantly, all Canadians must take action to address our past and foster reconciliation for a brighter future.” Yukon Premier Sandy Silver...
June 10, 2021
Brandon Indian Residential School Cemeteries project
APTN – The Sioux Valley Dakota Nation in Manitoba is partnered with the University of Windsor, Simon Fraser University (SFU) and Brandon University for the Brandon Residential Schools Cemeteries Project. “While employing archeological survey techniques, geophysical technologies, survival recounts and archival documents, our investigation has identified 104 potential graves in all three cemeteries, and that only 78...
June 6, 2021
Commitment to work with Indigenous leaders about what happened at the 14 schools
CBC – The territorial government says it is willing to work with Indigenous leaders to get to the truth about what may lie underground in the territory’s many former residential school locations. In the Northwest Territories there were 14 residential schools, run by church or state. In some communities, work has already been done to understand the...
June 1, 2021
Commitment to help searching for sites of unmarked graves
Montreal Gazette – Quebec Premier François Legault said that while residential schools fall under federal jurisdiction, the province is ready to participate in eventual searches of the sites. Quebec’s Indigenous affairs minister said Monday that the province is open to searching the grounds of former residential schools for graves, if survivors and their families are in...
June 1, 2021
Mohawk Institute : “The Mush Hole”
Toronto Star – One of the oldest residential schools opened in 1829 and was operated by the Anglican Church before being taken over by the federal government in 1885. History of escapes from the school are well documented, as are stories of physical and sexual abuse and of malnutrition. The latter complaint earned the school...
May 31, 2021
Call for the federal government to research undocumented deaths and burial in Indian residential schools
Saskatoon Star Phoenix – The Federation of Sovereign Indian Nations and the province issued a joint statement calling on the federal government “to immediately commence research on undocumented deaths and burials in residential schools in Saskatchewan, including radar ground search at residential school sites.” Initial sites identified to be investigated by radar ground search are: Onion...
May 31, 2021
Sir Joseph Bernier School
Nunatsiaq News – There have been calls to extradite one former residential staff member who is accused of abusing Inuit children during his time in Nunavut. Father Johannes Rivoire, now 90, was known to have worked in Chesterfield Inlet, the site of the infamous Sir Joseph Bernier School. The crimes he is accused of date back to the...
July 27, 2020
UCalgary researcher developing strategy to digitally archive residential school sites
Other News A UCalgary researcher is working with a number of partners across Canada to develop a strategy for digitally archiving the physical structures of the few remaining residential schools in Alberta. Two former provincial residential schools — Old Sun Community College and University nuhelot’įne thaiyots’į nistameyimâkanak Blue Quills — will be digitally captured by Blackfoot and...
August 28, 2018
Brandon Indian Residential School
Grand Chief Arlen Dumas of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs wants the city of Brandon to protect the unmarked graves that are now part of a RV campsite....
July 26, 2017
Regina Indian Industrial School (RIIS)
(RIIS) Cemetery has been designated a Provincial Heritage Property. The cemetery grounds contain the graves of approximately 35 children from First Nations and Métis communities in Saskatchewan, Alberta and Manitoba who died while attending the school....
May 11, 2016
Newfoundland and Labrador reach settlement on residential schools
Newfoundland and Labrador was excluded from Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement but reached a $50M settlement with the Government of Canada on May 11, 2016. See Call to Action # 29....
Prince Edward Island
PEI had no official Indian Residential schools...
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