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From the Timmins Daily Press

School finally coming

Tayo Adesanya - Local News - Monday, November 14, 2005 @ 07:00

After a five-year struggle, students in Attawapiskat will finally get a new elementary school, that will be up to the same standard as the rest of the province.

MP Charlie Angus (NDP — Timmins-James Bay) and MPP Gilles Bisson (NDP — Timmins-James Bay) announced Friday a new elementary school will be built in Attawapiskat.

Bisson said Indian and Northern Affairs Canada has given the Attawapiskat education authority and band council the go-ahead to begin construction.

“You should have heard the kids,” said Chief Mike Carpenter. “I went to the school, I told the students by announcing it on the radio. They were all yelling.

“One of the teachers told me one of the kids had remarked, ‘Gee, now I’ll be able to graduate with a new school.’”

The fight for a new school began five years ago when the old school was closed after thousands gallons of diesel fuel spilled due to errors in construction of a fuel oil pipeline .

Since 2000, the students have been studying in up to 19 portables, said education consultant and former director of the Timmins Board of Education Bill Blake.

“It’s not a good situation at all,” he said.

“I don’t think there was any dispute over the need for the school. The students in Attawapiskat needed a school built to provincial standards, and it looks as if they’ll get that now.”

Bisson and Angus said the federal government had previously promised a new building, but those plans never came to fruition.

“This has been a five-year fight … five years since the families pulled their kids out of the condemned school,” Angus said.

Angie Fiddler, KO's Youth Employment Coordinator, is in Tunis attending the United Nation's second World Summit of the Information Society. Jesse Fiddler attended the first WSIS gathering in Geneva in December 2003. Angie is documenting her experience on her web site at http://angiefiddler.myknet.org.

Industry Canada's First Nations SchoolNet requested proposals from Aboriginal youth from across Canada to attend this event and the Global Forum of Indigenous People. Angie submitted her proposal which was accepted along with five other First Nation youth from across Canada.

For more information about the World Summit of the Information Society visit their official site at http://www.itu.int/wsis

Rabbit and Bear Paws now considered fine art.

"The 18th century, will never be the same"

Visitors to Toronto’s annual Pow Wow held at the Rogers Skydome November 26th and November 27th this year may be surprised to see one of the selected artists in the ANDPVA’s 9th Annual Fine Arts Exhibit. Rabbit and Bear Paws, a colourful comic strip drawn by local First Nations artist Chad Solomon, was picked by the Association for Native Development in the Performing & Visual Arts to be part of this years display.

Rabbit and Bear Paws was selected for representing the theme of the Fine Arts’ Exhibit this year which is “Seeing in a Sacred Manner: The Shapes of All Things”

“Then I was standing on the highest mountain of them all, But anywhere is the center of the world and round about beneath me was the whole hoop of the world. And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being. And I say the sacred hoop of my people was one of the many hoops that made one circle, wide as day-light and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and one father. And I saw that it was holy…”

- Black Elk: Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, 1863-1950

Rabbit and Bear Paws is set in 18th Century colonized North America and follows the story of two mischievous Ojibwa brothers as they play pranks and have amazing adventures using a traditional Ojibwa medicine that transforms them into animals for a short time.

New episodes of Rabbit and Bear Paws’ adventures can be found weekly at www.saymag.com. To read character biographies or to view missed installments, visit www.rabbitandbearpaws.com or vote for your favourite character at www.ayn.ca/AYNHome.aspx. Just scroll down the page to join the journey.

"Little Spirit Bear Productions" is a First Nations (Anishinabek, Ojibwa) Multi-Media company that was created in 2005 by Chad Solomon, grandson of a Native Traditional Healer and Justice Activist Art Solomon, to share the humorous adventures of Rabbit and Bear Paws.

Rabbit and Bear Paws is created and drawn with the guidance of Community Elders in collaboration with writer Christopher Myer. The first series of comic strips are based upon the teachings of the Seven Grandfathers (wisdom from the Anishinabek community) and are rapidly gaining enthusiastic fans for their vibrant and entertaining images of Native Traditions and Oral History.

Rabbit and Bear Paws is printed monthly in the community papers of "Anishinabek News" and "Niiji (Friends) Circle".

The Rabbit and Bear Paws graphic novel will be on sale in March 2006, along with a new installment of the comic strip series based on the second of the Seven Grandfathers' teachings.

Visit the The Toronto Pow Wow, the center piece of the Canadian Aboriginal Festival at the Roger's Centre (SkyDome) on Saturday November 26th and Sunday November 27th. As one of the chosen exibitors you can view Chad’s work as part of the ANDPVA’s 9th Annual Fine Art Exhibit,

For more information please contact chadsol@gmail.com