Purpose of the group
The Indigenous Strategic Plan Implementation Sub-committee aims to enact the goals and actions of UBC’s Indigenous Strategic Plan in the UBCO Library context in support of the campus and larger community’s engagement with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls’ Calls for Justice, and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action.
Membership
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Sajni Lacey, Learning and Curriculum Support Librarian, Chair
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Jessica Lowry, Centre for Scholarly Communication Associate
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Donna Langille, Community Engagement and Open Education Librarian
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Amanda Brobbel, Senior Manager, Writing and Language Learning Supports
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Kristy Baxter, Centre for Scholarly Communication Coordinator (On Leave)
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Christian Isbister, Indigenous Initiatives Librarian
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Kim Buschert, Faculty of Management Librarian
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Michelle Tinling, Centre for Scholarly Communication Coordinator
Active projects
- Develop a plan for engaging with the ISP Self Assessment tool as a Library (in progress)
- Indigenous Strategic Plan and Inclusion Action Plan Undergraduate Student Internship (ongoing)
- Library internal live reading group of the Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action (session two in development)
- Library participation in the Orange Shirt Day 2022 initiative in collaboration with the larger EDI group and Learning, Research, and Engagement Working Group (in progress)
- Live reading and discussion of UNDRIP (in progress - tentatively scheduled for winter 2023)
Completed projects
- Brainstorm ways the Library can actively engage and lead projects related to the goals and actions of the ISP (completed Spring 2022)
- Indigenous Strategic Plan and Inclusion Action Plan Undergraduate Student Internship (Pilot project completed 2020/21, successful internship 2021/22)
- Library internal live reading group of the Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action (Session 1 completed April 2022)
- Discussion group on the What I Learned in Class Today - Renew Project Series (completed August 2021)
Orange Shirt Day
We, as a library, wear our orange shirts to signify that we stand in solidarity with survivors and those who have been affected by the harmful legacy of Residential Schools in Canada. We continue to create space amongst our team to learn and acknowledge the ongoing legacy and trauma of Residential Schools.
We do this through many of the initiatives outlined above, and providing through this group, multiple opportunities for learning, unlearning, and reflection on the role of libraries in colonization and White Supremacy.
See our full list of books for Orange Shirt Day.
From Bear Rock Mountain by ISBN: 9781927366806Publication Date: 2019-06-11In this poetic, poignant memoir, Dene artist and social activist Antoine Mountain paints an unforgettable picture of his journey from residential school to art school--and his path to healing. In 1949, Antoine Mountain was born on the land near Radelie Koe, Fort Good Hope, Northwest Territories. At the tender age of seven, he was stolen away from his home and sent to a residential school--run by the Roman Catholic Church in collusion with the Government of Canada--three hundred kilometres away. Over the next twelve years, the three residential schools Mountain was forced to attend systematically worked to erase his language and culture, the very roots of his identity. While reconnecting to that which had been taken from him, he had a disturbing and painful revelation of the bitter depths of colonialism and its legacy of cultural genocide. Canada has its own holocaust, Mountain argues. As a celebrated artist and social activist today, Mountain shares this moving, personal story of healing and the reclamation of his Dene identity.
A Knock on the Door by ISBN: 9780887557859Publication Date: 2015-12-18"It can start with a knock on the door one morning. It is the local Indian agent, or the parish priest, or, perhaps, a Mounted Police officer." So began the school experience of many Indigenous children in Canada for more than a hundred years, and so begins the history of residential schools prepared by the Truth & Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC). Between 2008 and 2015, the TRC provided opportunities for individuals, families, and communities to share their experiences of residential schools and released several reports based on 7000 survivor statements and five million documents from government, churches, and schools, as well as a solid grounding in secondary sources.A Knock on the Door, published in collaboration with the National Research Centre for Truth & Reconciliation, gathers material from the several reports the TRC has produced to present the essential history and legacy of residential schools in a concise and accessible package that includes new materials to help inform and contextualize the journey to reconciliation that Canadians are now embarked upon.Survivor and former National Chief of the Assembly First Nations, Phil Fontaine, provides a Foreword, and an Afterword introduces the holdings and opportunities of the National Centre for Truth & Reconciliation, home to the archive of recordings, and documents collected by the TRC. As Aimée Craft writes in the Afterword, knowing the historical backdrop of residential schooling and its legacy is essential to the work of reconciliation. In the past, agents of the Canadian state knocked on the doors of Indigenous families to take the children to school. Now, the Survivors have shared their truths and knocked back. It is time for Canadians to open the door to mutual understanding, respect, and reconciliation.
Sugar Falls by ISBN: 9781553793342Publication Date: 2012-01-20BASED ON A TRUE STORY* A school assignment to interview a residential school survivor leads Daniel to Betsy, his friend's grandmother, who tells him her story. Abandoned as a young child, Betsy was soon adopted into a loving family. A few short years later, at the age of 8, everything changed. Betsy was taken away to a residential school. There she was forced to endure abuse and indignity, but Betsy recalled the words her father spoke to her at Sugar Falls -- words that gave her the resilience, strength, and determination to survive. Sugar Falls is based on the true story of Betty Ross, Elder from Cross Lake First Nation. We wish to acknowledge, with the utmost gratitude, Betty's generosity in sharing her story. A portion of the proceeds from the sale of Sugar Falls goes to support the bursary program for The Helen Betty Osborne Memorial Foundation.
I Am Not a Number by ISBN: 9781927583944Publication Date: 2016-09-06When eight-year-old Irene is removed from her First Nations family to live in a residential school she is confused, frightened, and terribly homesick. She tries to remember who she is and where she came from, despite the efforts of the nuns who are in charge at the school and who tell her that she is not to use her own name but instead use the number they have assigned to her. When she goes home for summer holidays, Irene's parents decide never to send her and her brothers away again. But where will they hide? And what will happen when her parents disobey the law? Based on the life of co-author Jenny Kay Dupuis' grandmother, I Am Not a Number is a hugely necessary book that brings a terrible part of Canada's history to light in a way that children can learn from and relate to.
