Media.Knet.Ca

The Canadian Research Alliance For Community Innovation And Networking team met in Ottawa on Friday, Nov 26 and Saturday, Nov 27 to dicuss about evaluation tools and techiques. Brian Walmark, KO's Research Institute Coordinator, presented information about KO's work that included a variety of digital videos used to capture the thoughts of KO community members and funders regarding the migration of connectivity to remote and isolated First Nations in Ontario's far north. These materials and stories are being used to support the completion of the evaluation of KO's K-Net project.

Keewaytinook Okimakanak's K-Net Services is one of the seven case studies included in the CRACIN research initiative. Members of the CRACIN team demonstrated the use of K-Net's Breeze server to support the participation of other members of the team in the workshop.

Click here to see the workshop agenda

Dan Pellerin, K-Net's Network Manager, presented information about ICTs and broadband infrastructure in First Nations at today's session of the Aboriginal Voice roundtable in Toronto. Darrin Potter and Craig Hardy will be presenting tomorrow about the Keewaytinook Internet High School along with Fernando Oliveira who will share the story about the KO Grade 8 Supplementary Courses.

This is the second roundtable in a series of four and is the topic for this Ontario Roundtable is Aboriginal E-learning. Two more roundtables are planned for the western and northern regions of the country. The roundtable discussions is being coordinated by a consulting group (KTA - Kaufman, Thomas and Associates, Inc.) and their KTA Centre for Collaborative Government divisioin.

From their Aboriginal Voice web site (click here to learn more) ...

"Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are poised to revolutionize the way in which governments interact and provide services and information to their citizens. Aboriginal Canadians have begun to develop ICT as an essential tool in governance, information sharing, and service provision. If harnessed appropriately, ICT offers critical opportunities to strengthen cultural identity, promote sustainable community development, and greater self-reliance among Aboriginal peoples. ...

On November 20, 2004, the Honourable Carolyn Bennett, Minister of State for Public Health, visited the Keewaytinook Okimakanak office in Sioux Lookout.

Roger Valley, MP, hosted the Minister during her visit to the Kenora riding. On Saturday, Minister Bennett and Roger drove from Dryden in a snow storm to participate in the planned session.

After meeting the K-Net team at the Keewaytinook Okimakanak office, a driving tour of the Kuhkenah Network including the new 7.3M satellite earthstation provided the minister with an orientation about the work being done in delivering community based connectivity solutions for remote communities across northern Ontario. The tour included the community’s health care facilities with presentations and demonstrations at the Teleheath and Teleradiology facilities at Menoyawin Health Care Centre.

Returning to the Keewaytinook Okimakanak office building, a virtual Minister’s Roundtable on Public Health and Technology took place.  This was accomplished through a video conference, linking Sioux Lookout with Balmertown, Thunder Bay and Keewaywin First Nation.  The event included presentations on programs including:  Telehealth; Diabetes; Aboriginal Head Start; Tobacco and the proposed KO Virtual Health Access Centre.

Participants in the roundtable discussion and presentations included representatives from the Keewaytinook Okimakanak’s (KO) Balmertown office and their Teleheath Program (Penny Carpenter) and Research Institute in Thunder Bay (Brian Walmark).  As well as representatives from Keewaywin First Nation (Chief Raymond Mason and his team of health care providers) and Lac Seul First Nation (Chief David Gordon and Jennifer Manitowabi); Sioux Lookout First Nations Health Authority (Janet Gordon), SLAAMB (Sam Manitowabi), Northern Ontario School of Medicine (Orpah McKenzie, Aboriginal Affairs Director and Dr. Dan Hunt, Western Campus Dean) and Health Canada (Mike Lovett, Zone Director).

The roundtable meeting was followed by a traditional feast of wild food (goose, wild rice, moose, fish, deer, bannock, blueberry pie, etc) that was coordinated by Jeannie Carpenter and Tabatha Jourdain.

Geordi Kakepetum, Executive Director of Keewaytinook Okimakanak commented in the Nov 10 press release, “it is always a pleasure to showcase and celebrate with government officials and our partners, the work that has been achieved with their strategic investments in First Nations communities and organizations.”

“It is a privilege to have the Honourable Carolyn Bennett, Minister of State for Public Health, visit the Kenora riding.  The Minister has expressed a keen interest to learn more about the uniqueness of the Kenora riding in terms of public health issues as well as the use of technology to address public health needs” added Roger Valley, MP, Kenora.

For further information contact:
Trudy Griffiths, Executive Assistant, Roger Valley, MP (807) 221-7060

The K-Net Story - Weaving the Networked Economy has now been released in a video format. This new video production produced by George Ferreira, a Phd candidate at the University of Guelph, pulled this one together after visiting all the KO First Nations and various K-Net partners.

The K-Net Story can be found at:

http://streaming.knet.ca/knet-story_100k.wmv
http://streaming.knet.ca/knet-story_300k.wmv

This video production is available on a DVD which is divided up into six
chapters (Introduction, Network Development, Economic Development, Health
Care, Education and Visions for the Future). The entire video is 30 minutes
in length.

Everyone's feedback and comments on the K-Net Story video production is appreciated. Please e-mail me at brian.beaton@knet.ca

Audience members recommended KO seek funding from Heritage Canada to increase the amount of First Nations cultural content on the 'Net...

As a final deliverable under Industry Canada's Smart Communities demonstration project, Keewaytinook Okimakanak First Nations constructed new buildings to accommodate the KiHS classrooms (in five of the KO First Nations) and the e-Centres (in three of the communities). The buildings are now nearing completion and are slowly being set up for their intended purposes. FedNor was the principal funding partner in the purchase, construction and furnishing of these facilities in each of these communities.

On November 16, Jerry Pokrupa from Keewaytinook Okimakanak's Public Works team joined Langreen, the construction and project contractor, on a tour of the facilities and the work completed to date. Click here to see the pictures of these new facilities in Deer Lake (still under construction), Keewaywin, North Spirit Lake and Poplar Hill.

A new research network – RICTA - has now been created thanks in part to Keewaytinook Okimakanak. The network name is Research on ICT (information and communication technologies) with Aboriginal Communities. Brian Walmark, the KO Research Coordinator, is working with Susan O’Donnell, a Research Officer with the National Research Council - Institute for Information Technology and an Adjunct Professor at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, and others to establish RICTA. Together they prepared and were successful in accessing a SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council) grant for $30,000 under the Strategic Research Clusters Design Grant to assist in establishing the RICTA network.

Everyone is invited to visit the new RICTA web site at http://ricta.ca

The first RICTA members include 24 social scientists from Canadian universities, three international researchers, nine community and government representatives, and one private sector representative.

For more KO research developments, visit the KO Research Institute web site at http://research.knet.ca

Jean-Francois Delorme (JF), with the Kativik Regional Government office in Kuujjuaq, arrived at K-Net's office in Sioux Lookout on October 31. He is spending this week working with the K-Net team to further develop the satellite network system that is serving the fourteen Inuit communities in northern Quebec.  Togehter, JF and the K-Net team are working together to establish the necessary protocols and procedures for maintaining and supporting our respective partner communities using the available satellite and earthstation resources.

Link here to read more about this work that began during his last visit to Sioux Lookout in April.

Five members of the Northern Ontario School of Medicine team (www.normed.ca) visited with Keewaytinook Okimakanak staff yesterday in Sioux Lookout. From the Thunder Bay campus, Dr. Dan Hunt, Campus Dean West, Dr. Jill Konkin, Associate Dean Admissions and Student Affairs, Orpah McKenzie, Aboriginal Affairs Director, were joined by Ann Moro, Clinical Sciences Coordinator and Dr. Tim Zmijowskyj, Clinical Curriculum Director from the Sudbury Campus of the new medical school. As well, Carl Seibel, Telecom Project Officer with Industry Canada FedNor joined the group for their two days of meetings with First Nation organizations, health care professionals and tours of the available resources.

Oscar Meekis, Deer Lake's local network manager, has been setting up IP phones in each of the local offices throughout his community. He submitted the following report and pictures showcasing how these units are working for his community. Click here to see the pictures of the IP phones in Deer Lake.

Here is an update on the IP phone installations in Deer Lake. So far a total of 44 IP phones were installed (or will be installed). There are some IP phones that are not installed due to renovations, construction or buildings been moved to another location. The places where the IP phones were successfully installed include the Band Office, Head Start Children Centre, Deer Lake Nursing Station, the Health program offices and Deer Lake School. Places that still needs installation due to modems not available yet (on order) are Deer Lake Warehouse, Deer Lake Garage and Deer Lake Water Treatment Plant and Radio Station. The Health Office building is being moved to another location near its original location.

I gathered some comments from various local organizations about what they like about their new IP phones. Some of the comments include:

Band Office Resource Worker/EDO - Donald Meekis - "I use the phone quite a bit. The clarity of the phone is better than the regular phones. The dialing is better with less numbers. It needs to be expanded more. Funding Agencies should have these phones."

Deer Lake Councillor - Cory J. Meekis - "It's not long distance, free of charge and it's direct lines to other offices. They are being answered right away."

Deer Lake School - Principal Ross Little - "They are GREAT!!!"

Deer Lake Nursing Station - R/N Madonna Kerfont - "Very convenient, less time and very cost effective. The Referral Clerk uses the IP phone a lot."

Deer Lake Education Director's comment (Roy Dale Meekis). When i got to his office to install the IP phone, he asked "what are you installing now?" I replied, "an IP phone." He asked again, what are they going to think of next? Pretty soon I will just say "beam me up!" :)