Sandy Lake Recreational-35 year old & plus-Old-timers Invitational Hockey Tournament:

February 19, 20, 21, 2004

Entry Fee: $600.00

Prizes: 1st Place: $3000.00

           2nd Place: $1500.00

           3rd Place: $600.00

For more information Please call:

Ringo Fiddler @ 807-774-5531

Kennedy Fiddler @807-774-5121(wk), 9958(hm) or

call Recreation Office @ 807-774-5445

Later this afternoon a group of people from Industry Canada in Ottawa and Thunder Bay will be arriving in Sioux Lookout to visit K-Net and to learn about the work we are doing in this region.

They include:

• Ross Macleod - Director General of the Information Highway Applications Branch who is charge of all the different programs we are using including Smart, BRAND, SchoolNet, CAP, etc
• Pierre Gendron - Director of SchoolNet who is in charge of the First Nations SchoolNet program
• Suzanne Robert - Manager of the First Nations SchoolNet program
• Valerie Ladouceur - Project Officer for the First Nations SchoolNet program
• Kathy Fisher -  Senior Advisor with the BRAND program
• Carl Seibel - Telecom Projects Officer - FedNor Program

The two days of meetings and tours will involve demonstrations and discussions about the importance of connectivity, broadband applications and adequate telecom infrastructure in the First Nations across the province. The tenative agenda for these next few days follows.

Industry Canada visit to Sioux Lookout
January 14 - 16, 2004

• Arrival on Bearskin flight 349 at 4:40 pm
• Pick up at airport and check in at hotel
• Supper with K-Net team at Forest Inn Dining Room scheduled for 6:30 pm
• Informal discussions and preparations for next day (tour of office)

8:00 am to 12:00 pm -

• Group 1: Ross, Carl, Cathy, Dan, John, Ernie - flight to Slate Falls First Nation - satellite served community with single Bell Canada pay phone, C-Band earth station, IP video and telephony service, meetings with Slate Falls community leaders and members.
  
• Group 2: Pierre, Suzanne, Valerie, Brian, Barb - drive to Lac Seul First Nation to visit two First Nation schools (Kejick Bay and Whitefish Bay) originally connected via DirecPC, now using two way satellite service with migration plans to broadband wireless solution - meeting with Education Director, school personnel, community leadership, Keewaytinook Internet High School staff and students

12:30 pm Lunch at Keewaytinook Okimakanak - discussions about the highlights from morning visits and tours - video connections with other community sites

1:30 pm Video session with Web Site Development workshop taking place with group in Thunder Bay

2:00 pm Tour of local facilities and resources including:

• local fibre loop connecting all the different Aboriginal agencies and services
• C-Band satellite site
• wireless loop
• server facilities (public library, office)
• local partners and applications (education, health, etc)

2:30 pm Review of various broadband applications (education, health, administration, etc) via video conference session with First Nations and organizations

3:30 pm Ricardo Ramirez, University of Guelph - program evaluation work

4:00 pm Broadband connectivity needs and issues (National Satellite Initiative, applications, etc)

4:30 pm SchoolNet initiatives and applications (Internet High School, grade 8 supplementary program, video conferencing, connectivity, etc)

5:00 pm Supper Break - Sunset Inn - Dick and Nellie’s at 6:30 pm

Friday, January 16

9:00 am Pelican Falls First Nations Secondary School - NIS participant - tour, meeting with principal and teacher involved with the school

10:30 am Community-based, regional, national and international initiatives, issues and directions (connections with the KO First Nations)

11:30 am Future Issues and Requirements

12:30 pm Lunch at Forest Inn

2:00 pm Airport and flight back to Ottawa

The Hon. James K. Bartleman, Ontario's 27th Lieutenant Governor visited Keewaytinook Okimakanak in Balmertown to learn about the Keewaytinook Internet High School and the KO Telehealth initiative. Click here to visit his web site. NAN's Grand Chief Stan Beardy and Red Lake's Major Duncan Wilson joined the Lieutenant Governor during the session.

The visit included a feast hosted by Keewaytinook Okimakanak staff and video conference sessions with First Nation schools and health centres. Click here to view the photo gallery of the visit.

One of His Honours’ goals while in office is to help establish a library in the Aboriginal communities and he asked the students and staff from Fort Severn, Deer Lake, Keewaywin, and North Spirit Lake, how a library would benefit them. Some of the communities have a library already, but were quick to indicate that any additional library resources would be very beneficial and useful to students in northern communities. They look forward to the Lieutenant Governor's support with this in the future.

Each of the above four communities was able to connect with Balmertown and participate in the presentation via video conference. An overview of KiHS was given and then a connection was made to the web site and His Honour was shown how a student would access his/her courses and submit them during a typical school day. The session was very informative and KO was able to successfully demonstrate once again how it was a leading force in the area for an innovative educational experience in our region and even beyond. There were several questions asked as students and staff discussed the Lieutenant Governor’s roles and responsibilities.

The Lieutenant Governor is interested in connecting with as many First Nation communities as possible across Ontario. Keewaytinook Okimakanak hopes that follow up video conferencing sessions can be facilitated to share more information among the First Nation schools and communities across the province.

The new book "Distance Education in Remote Aboriginal Communities: Barriers, Learning Styles and Best Practices" by Bill McMullen and Andreas Rohrbach and published by the College of New Caledonia Press in Prince George, BC, is now available on-line. Click here to check out this very informative and useful book.

There is a special dedication to Margaret Fiddler, the visionary who helped create Wahsa and KiHS and founding principal of both these organizations and who is living in Sandy Lake First Nation.

The new K-Net Network Management Centre is now set up with the connections, staff and equipment completing the move over this past week. Dan and Adi are now working in this centre managing the network and the new server room.

Most of the main servers (knet.ca, kihs, myknet.org, mail, etc) were moved over last evening. The system was shut down for nearly three hours to complete the transfer of the equipment from the main KO office building furnance room over to the new facility.

K-Net quickly outgrew its former server space over the past year with increased demand from the northern First Nations for on-line services. A project with FedNor called the On-line Training Project, made it possible to expand the existing K-Net equipment building to create this new facility located at 115 King Street (click here to see the pictures of the building construction).

Five members of the new Northern Ontario Medical School journeyed to Balmertown on Thursday to meet with the KO team and the Red Lake physicians. They included Dr. David Boyle (Executive Director, Project Development), Martha Musicco (Associate Manager, Project Office), Robert Barnett (Data Researcher, NHIP), Jim Harrold (Interim Theme Coordinator) and the trip organizer, Orpah McKenzie (Interim Director, Aboriginal Affairs). During their visit to the KO office, everyone met with a group of  Poplar Hill community members and health staff via video conference. A second video conference with the Sandy Lake health office also provided the NOMS team with the opportunity to meet with additional community members. Click here to view the photos.

On Friday, several members of the team (including Todd Dufresne) met with the K-Net team in Sioux Lookout to identify strategies to work together. A quick tour of the K-Net facilities, meeting the team and viewing some of the on-line resources provided the NOMS group some additional references for their work. Click here to read the KO briefing paper presented to the NOMS staff. 

Later at the Sioux Lookout First Nations Health Authority, all the tribal councils and other First Nation organizations were invited to meet with the NOMS team to discuss some of the opportunities that exist for the First Nations to work with NOMS. First Nations are being invited to host first year medical students during a four week placement that is to provide an alternative learning environment and development opportunity for the students, NOMS and the communities. The session is called "Aboriginal Year 1 Clerkship Experience".

The "Expression of Interest: Community Information and Guidelines" were distributed to everyone in attendance with additional copies being made available through Orpah McKenzie. As well, the "Report of the NOMS Aboriginal Workshop" (June 2003) was presented to everyone.

NOMS is interested in partnering with First Nations to identify a strategy to create a successful learning opportunity for everyone willing to participate in this work. This will involve identifying and hiring local resource people who will be considered NOMS faculty members to support, assess and providing learning opportunities for the students during these placements.

For more information about these partnership possibilities contact Orpah McKenzie, NOMS Interim Director, Aboriginal Affairs in Thunder Bay or Martha Musicco, Associate Manager, NOMS Project Office in Sudbury

Fernando Oliveira is now preparing to teach the Grade 8 Math supplementary course curriculum starting the week of January 19 in First Nation schools across Ontario. He is doing this from his home office in Toronto by using the internet and other on-line communication tools and resources. Check out this work at http://g8.firstnationschools.ca. Fifteen First Nation schools have registered so far for these supplementary Math units to support the students in their regular classes.

The fall semester Fernando delivered a variety of Grade 8 Science supplementary units in 11 different First Nation classrooms. Click here to read his report and the comments from the teachers about this experience.

This initiative was first piloted in the spring of 2003 working with the Keewaytinook Okimakanak community partners working together in the development and delivery of the Keewaytinook Internet High School. Fernando, who use to teach with KiHS in the remote First Nations of Poplar Hill and Fort Severn, agreed to develop and facilitate the delivery of on-line science units for Grade 8 students in 8 communities. This pilot proved very successful (click here to read the June report).

This past fall, Keewaytinook Okimakanak partnered with Industry Canada's First Nations SchoolNet program to offer a series of on-line Grade 8 supplementary course material to support students and staff in the delivery of the Science, Math and English curriculum. Once again, Fernando agreed to coordinate the development and delivery of this material.

Communications In the Public Interest Vol. 2
Seeking Convergence in Policy and Practice

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Democratic Deficit in Canadian; ICT Policy and Regulation
Darin Barney, University of Ottawa

Intellectual Property Rights and the Disciplining of Higher Education in Canada and Mexico
Jerrold L. Kachur, University of Alberta

Sewers and Asphalt: The Stuff of Digital Dreams? The re-regulation of telecommunication industries and democracy in Canada
Christopher Bodnar, Carleton University

Public Access, Personal Privacy and Media Interweaving in Everyday Internet Experiences: Exploring Current Policy Concerns Via a ‘Neighbourhood Ethnography’
Andrew Clement, Jane Aspinall, Ana Viseu and Tracy Kennedy, University of Toronto

Living Smart In Two Worlds: Maintaining and Protecting First Nation Culture for Future Generations
Brian Beaton, Jesse Fiddler and John Rowlandson, K-Net

Nishnawbe Aski Development Fund is working with other Community Futures Development Corporations in the region with this business plan development project for high school students.  

Working with K-Net, we are planning to have training sessions on business plan development via video conference with interested schools and students. We are willing to help the students complete their business plans by having these workshops and some training sessions.

We are now promoting this contest across the region in the hope that some high school students may be interested in registering for this contest.

Please visit www.survival.gokenora.com to find out more information about this contest. The registration forms and some additional background information is available by e-mailing myself at rcheechoo@nadf.org.

We would like to have workshops done before each challenge. Details are available on each of the challenges at the website.

Background Information:

Click here for the Judging Criteria for the Business Plan Competition