Building a Fire: Envisioning Indigenous Achievement. Dr. Nigaan Sinclair
I was honoured to have the opportunity to attend Dr. Nigaan Sinclair’s keynote event at Vanier Hall. Nigaan is a brilliant speaker and I learned lots during his talk. Nigaan discussed his journey through life and spoke of the importance of teaching young Indigenous students about their roots. He emphasized the importance of four questions of Indigenous curriculum: Who am I? Why am I here? Who can I help? and Where am I going? Indigenous people are underrepresented in all aspects of Canadian public and private life, such as government, and this needs to change. Nigaan also discussed how we currently train kids for the workplace and not to become better people. Individuality, productivity, and competition are antithetical to teaching kindness and the importance of community. We need more Indigenous representation in leadership positions, especially at our schools. We also need to find ways to incorporate Indigenous languages into our schools.
The main factors that all school programs should centre around are Relationships, Relevance, Respect, and Responsibility.
This keynote left me with a lot to think about. My favourite quote of the presentation: “When Indigenous people succeed, non-Indigenous people succeed. When Canada succeeds, often times Indigenous people suffer.”