It’s really surprising to me how little our younger
people usually know about their own heritage
creates a situation for that person
where they’re participating on a daily
basis, they have responsibilities,
they are part of the community and
they’re responsible for something.
A lot of these individuals who
are not doing well don’t have that
responsibility, they don’t have that tie
to the community, and they don’t feel
like they’re a part of anything.”
To help change this, the tribe runs a
variety of employment programs, all
designed to find band members work
and link them to their community.
These programs include the
Agricultural Training Initiative, as
well as the Blood Tribe Employment
and Skills Training (BTEST) program,
a project in Fort McKay (in which
band members travelled north to
help the Fort McKay band with
infrastructure projects), a mould
remediation training program,
childcare worker education and a
security personnel training program.
A lack of education, training and
skills are not the only barriers to
employment band members face.
White Quill lists others on her
fingers. “Transportation, having
a driver’s licence, insurance,
registration, childcare, mental health,
physical health, family situations,
historical family patterns. Every one
of these things has to be taken into
account for someone to be successful
in the end.”
In Canada, the life expectancy for
First Nations people is lower than
non-aboriginals, although the gap is
closing. In the past two decades the
difference has halved, due mainly
to lower infant mortality rates,
improved sanitation and a greater
knowledge of health in general. Yet,
Alberta don’t finish high school, and
that number rises to nearly two-
thirds on-reserve. The rate is up to
five times more than non-aboriginals
20 to 34 years old. Education is an
important social determinant of
health. It’s like income—the more
people have, the better their health.
More education also means a better
chance at understanding health and
the health-care system, making a
higher income, keeping a job and
having a healthy workplace. A First
Nations person is, simply, much more
likely to have poor health.
First Charger showed agricultural program students photos of his ancestors, the
people who signed Treaty 7. He
noted the actual Treaty 7 document
was irrelevant to the tribe’s leaders
because none of them could speak or
read English. “What was meaningful
to them,” said First Charger, “was
the sharing of tobacco, the exchange.
That was the treaty to them. And let
me tell you,” he paused for effect, “no
First Nations tribe has broken a treaty
yet.”
Students across the room nodded
and murmured. Some of the younger
men were hunched forward in their
chairs, rapt.
It’s really surprising to me,” Calf Robe had said to me earlier that day, “how little our younger
people usually know about their own
heritage.”
“And it’s now a huge part of our
educational/work prep process,”
added Beebe. “It’s part of building a
community and making them part of
that community.”
“It’s huge,” said Calf Robe. “They
just have no idea who they are,
what their heritage is, who their
grandparents were. Which means
they have no real foundation to fall
back on, no sense of community.”
A significant cause of this culture
gap is the residential school legacy,
during which there was no transfer
of knowledge, history, legacy or
tradition. There was no passing down
from grandparent to parent to child,
because generational patterns were
violently disrupted.
“This cultural component in our
job preparation,” said White Quill, “is
very, very important to the success
of (our) programs. It really helps to
start out with the cultural component
because so much of what these kids
