ONE IS TO MANY (OMAZINIBII’IGEG)
Current Reality
The commission that has spent five years examining one of the darkest chapters in Canada’s history is winding up its work with a key question left unanswered – exactly how many aboriginal children died in residential schools? Justice Murray Sinclair, who heads the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, says the federal government stopped recording the deaths around 1920 after the chief medical officer at Indian Affairs suggested children were dying at an alarming rate. Sinclair has guessed up to 6,000 children may have died at the schools but it’s impossible to say with certainty. (Global News, May 31, 2015)
https://globalnews.ca/news/2027587/deaths-at-canadas-indian-residential-schools-need-more-study-commission/
Sites of unmarked graves at former residential Schools
Feb. 1, 2022: National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) – announced a partnership to advance Indigenous-led research. The collaboration will foster research on reconciliation and residential schools, done by and with Indigenous communities. It will leverage the skills and knowledge of both parties—the NCTR’s expertise and ability to safeguard the truths of Survivors, their families, communities and others affected by the residential school system; and SSHRC’s role to promote and support research and training in the humanities and social sciences.
The new partnership is an important step in further responding to Truth and Reconciliation Commission Call to Action 65, and supporting calls 71 to 76
| Indian Residential School | Date of Discovery |
# of unmarked graves |
Official recorded deaths |
| Kamloops IRS, BC | May 27, 2021 |
200 |
51 |
| Muscowequan IRS, SK | June 1, 2021 |
35 |
– |
| Brandon IRS, MB | June 10, 2021 |
104 |
78 |
| Marieval IRS, SK | June 25, 2021 |
751 |
8 |
| St. Eugene’s IRS, BC | June 30, 2021 |
182 |
19 |
| Kuper Island IRS, BC | July 13, 2021 |
160+ |
120 |
| St. Joseph’s Mission IRS, BC | Jan. 26, 2022 |
93 |
– |
| St. Philip’s IRS, SK
Fort Pelly IRS, SK |
Feb. 15, 2022 |
12 42 |
2 2 |
| St. Bernard’s IRS, AB | Mar. 1, 2022 |
169 |
10 |
| Gordon’s IRS, SK | April 21, 2022 |
14 |
49 |
| TOTAL |
1,762 |
339 |
Aug. 11, 2021: The federal government is committing $321M in new funding for Indigenous communities and appointing a special interlocutor to propose law and policy changes to better responds to the findings of unmarked graves at former residential school sites:
- $83M added to the existing $27M program to fund searches of burial sites and commemorate the children who died at residential school
- $107M for programs to support healing from intergenerational trauma
- $100M over two years to help Indigenous communities manage residential school buildings
- $20M to build a national monument in Ottawa to honour the survivors and aall the children who were lost.