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From CALGARY HERALD 

Aboriginal school conditions dismay panel - Patchwork system has failed students 'miserably'

BY DARCY HENTON, FEBRUARY 11, 2012

An independent panel investigating aboriginal education found 100 crumbling schools on reserves across Canada and some in Alberta that failed to even fit the definition of a school, says panel chair Scott Haldane.

One school in Swan River in northern Alberta "was just a bunch of portables in a field."

"It is not a school you would send your kid to," said Haldane, the president of YMCA Canada who was selected by the federal minister of Aboriginal Affairs and the National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, to chair the threemember panel.

"Even new schools had no books in their libraries, computers that didn't work or were really old, and no equipment in the workshops and gymnasiums. We consistently saw evidence of underfunding of schools."

The panel, which includes a former Saskatchewan Cree chief and a B.C. educator, is calling for the creation of a national aboriginal education system to provide 120,000 First Nations children with an opportunity to learn and participate in the economy.

It says less than 40 per cent of youth living on reserves have completed high school.

In a report released this week, the panel said the current patchwork system is failing aboriginal children and called for creation of an accountable first nations commission in three months to produce a First Nation Education Act and form regional education boards.

Alberta Education Minister Thomas Lukaszuk said the dropout rate of aboriginal students in schools in this province is closer to 80 per cent and he said he is working with federal Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan to address the problem.

"We agree that whatever has been done for nearly the last 150 years relevant to aboriginal education has simply failed miserably," Lukaszuk told the Calgary Herald editorial board recently. That means it is incumbent on us to start thinking in a much more innovative way and set aside the limitations placed upon us by the British North America Act that clearly defines what is federal jurisdiction and what is provincial . . . and to focus on Aboriginal children no matter where they are."

He said the statistics are horrendous and they aren't much better off reserves than they are on reserves.

"I firmly believe we can't fail much more," he said. "I think we are pretty close to having bottomed out."

Lukaszuk said the key to ending the cycle of poverty and social issues plaguing aboriginal communities is to reach aboriginal children when they are young and work with aboriginal leaders to give them the tools and environment to learn.

He noted provincial schools receive base funding of $7,000 per student compared to about $4,000 per student allocated to federally-operated First nations schools.

"Right now, there and then, you have a gap," said Lukaszuk. "There is already a lack of equality in funding."

He said that gap must be closed even if the provincial government has to pay the difference.

"I consider it to be an investment," he said. "I see nothing wrong with moving beyond the BNA Act and funding every child in Alberta at the same rate, which may mean we have to step up with the difference."

Lukaszuk said it may require a different agreement with the federal government, "but I have to tell you I find it grossly inappropriate to accept the fact that this is the way it is and this is the way it has always been."

He said he feels he has a fiduciary responsibility to provide a better education for aboriginal children.

"These are Canadians. They are Alberta kids."

Alberta has 15 federally-run First Nations schools on reserves and 14 provincially-run aboriginal schools off reserves and they are failing aboriginal students, he said.

"We don't even know how many kids we're talking about," he said. "That's how desperate the situation is and that's why I think that should be one of our provincial and national priorities if we are ever to turn the situation around."

Haldane said the panel met with First nations people representing Treaties 6, 7, and 8 in Calgary, Edmonton and Slave Lake and received powerful presentations on what needs to change to make the education system work.

"Most of the testimony was quite emotional," Haldane said. "We were struck by the potential and the resilience of the young people."

He said the single most common issue raised was the shortage of funding, but he says throwing money at the problem won't work.

"We don't think money is the answer, but we think the answer requires money," he said.

He said there are not only moral but also economic reasons to address the issue now with serious labour shortages looming.

Report after report, including the premier's Council on Economic Strategy chaired by David Emerson, all stressed the critical need for an improved aboriginal education system and the necessity of bringing First Nations people into the workforce.

"The fastest growing demographic is the least engaged in the economy," Haldane said. "We have a choice. We can have them become a growing cost or come to grips with the investment to make them contributing members of society."