IPK 100, Learn Today, Lead Tomorrow, Deborah Alexander

For over 100 years, thousands of Aboriginal children passed through the Canadian residential school system. Begun in the 1870s, it was intended, in the words of government officials, to bring these children into the "circle of civilization," the results, however, were far different. More often, the schools provided an inferior education in an atmosphere of neglect, disease, and often abuse. Using previously unreleased government documents, historian John S. Milloy provides a full picture of the history and reality of the residential school system. He begins by tracing the ideological roots of the system, and follows the paper trail of internal memoranda, reports from field inspectors, and letters of complaint. In the early decades, the system grew without planning or restraint. Despite numerous critical commissions and reports, it persisted into the 1970s, when it transformed itself into a social welfare system without improving conditions for its thousands of wards. A National Crime shows that the residential system was chronically underfunded and often mismanaged, and documents in detail and how this affected the health, education, and well-being of entire generations of Aboriginal children. [From Publisher]

Truth and reconciliation are new words in the vocabulary of Canadians speaking about our history and our future in this land. The standard history, which resonates especially with those of European ancestry, is a grand narrative of pioneers and waves of immigrants birthing a peaceable nation from a vast, untamed landscape. The Aboriginal peoples of Canada—First Nations, Inuit, and Métis—tell different stories, of ancient origins preserved in legends, of migrations that spanned the continent, of trading networks and treaty making and sporadic conflicts to establish boundaries between nations, of prophecies that foretold how their lives would be changed by newcomers to their lands. [From Author]

Beyond the Orange Shirt Story is a unique collection of truths, as told by Phyllis Webstad's family and others, that will give readers an up-close look at what life was like before, during, and after their Residential School experiences. In this book, Survivors and Intergenerational Survivors share their stories authentically and in their own words. [From Publisher]

For over 100 years, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate operated St. Mary's Mission, a residential school near Mission, BC. Now the stories of its former students are told for the first time. In Amongst God's Own, acclaimed writer Terry Glavin has woven the accounts of 35 native elders into a bold, uncompromising narrative of life at St. Mary's. [From Publisher]

At the same time, one must also acknowledge the absence in mainstream discourse of the ways in which Aboriginal children and youth have kept well and safe despite the tremendous odds imposed by the residential school experience. [...] While it is common in the popular media to explain such resilience purely in terms of individual character traits, it is, in fact, the result of an interplay between risk on the one hand and a variety of protective factors on the other (Fraser and Richman, 2001). [...] What is important to remember, however, is that resilience only operates in response to the presence of risk conditions and that possession of appropriate personal and social assets is not sufficient in and of itself to guarantee a positive outcome. [...] This is seen in any number of traditional practices adhered to in Aboriginal communities across the country, such as the preservation of umbilical cords in amulets or the mounting of willow switches on the wall as a constant reminder for children to behave. [...] From this perspective, the sayings related above can be reinterpreted so as to emphasize their underlying messages, such as the inter-dependence of people and animals; the importance of consciousness, knowledge and love; and the need for children to be safe and injury-free, just like the fearsome bear. [From Website]