A small group gathered to share the stories of residential school survivors this past weekend.
At Northern College, community members and families gathered to learn more about the work the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR) is doing.
“The real need now is to continue to gather those statements,” said Trina McKellep, a statement-gathering co-ordinator with the NCTR. ”These memories and histories need to come from the people themselves.”
McKellep and Elder Mike Metatawabin from Fort Albany gave presentations on the impact of the residential school systems and the work that is being done now to help those who are dealing with the trauma involved.
There had been a sharing circle planned for Sunday, but due to a lack of interest in the event, it was cancelled.
“If people are interested in looking for events like that, there is information on our website,” said McKellep.
McKellep also spoke about the work being done in locating unmarked graves at residential school sites across the country, and how the statements from survivors are important to filling in the gaps in the records.
“This information is going to come from the people,” she said. “All the church and school documents have different stories, but then you have a couple letters from the teachers that actually cared, you start to see some of the real story emerge and then you fill in the gap from talking to the survivors of the space.”
Pamela Veranus has been working as a statement gatherer since the conception of the original Truth and Reconciliation Commission's (TRC) mandate and has done this work for the National Enquiry on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. She is a Red River Métis citizen from Treaty 1 in Manitoba.
“We create a space so they can share their truth,” she said. “It does two things, it allows the opportunity to take those things and get it off of their spirit, and then it also allows us to fill in the gaps in the records.”
She's looking forward to passing this work onto another generation to help collect and keep those stories safe.
“I’m hoping to be able to pass the torch to another generation who can keep this work going,” she said. “It's important to be able to share the gifts and the teachings that I’ve received.”
It is important to remember whose stories these are and not to claim ownership of them, Veranus said.
“They’re not your stories to keep, so there has to be a way to pass those stories onto a safe place where they need to go,” she said. “It’s about holding those stories in that safe space until they’re ready to be passed on.”
McKellep said that the biggest thing that she needed to do to complete the work is understanding and processing the statements and the truth of what happened to the survivors.
“I came into this position not really understanding residential schools because that topic was so hidden, it wasn’t really shared in community,” she said. “That was the hurtle, overcoming my lack of knowledge and I’ve jumped right in and learned directly from the survivors.”
She said there needs to be support, both within the Indigenous community and non-Indigenous communities, to help share the responsibility to preserve the information.
“We have a lot of the survivors which is great, we can get together and network, but they’re carrying so much of it and we need other people to come in and help us do the work,” said Trina. “That's the importance of connecting into the non-Indigenous community, to the newcomer community so they can better understand the history of Canada.”
Veranus said that learning these things can shift the way people look at Canada.
“That was hard to reconcile within myself and there was a lot of truth and reconciliation within ourselves personally,” said Veranus. “We see this country from a different lens or we understand our families from a different perspective, so there was a lot of processing that’s taken place over the last 13 years.”
The NCTR started doing online statement gathering during the pandemic and McKellep said that has opened doors to survivors who may not be able to travel or attend events.
“We’re working with Health Canada to find the best way to do it because they also have the financial support because they are mandated to support former students,” she said about the supports in place to support survivors in online statement gathering. “so we can collaborate with them and allow this space to continue to happen.”
McKellep said that they are very motivated to support survivors in sharing their story in whatever way works for them.
“The online statement gathering is relatively new, but we send out the information to people, to let them know they can do private one-on-one,” she said. “But if we can’t get there, Health Canada can send their supports who go into the home, and we set it up on Zoom.”
“Now with technology where it is, it’s become a lot easier to share these stories,” said Veranus. “So now that these things are being talked about, there are more people taking the initiative to document these stories and keep them safe.”
The NCTR website holds information on how to access records, the work they are doing, and how to submit a statement.
