Culture on the rise in schools

Native liaison workers in Peace Country schools are busy helping Native students achieve their goals and create a vision for themselves after graduation.

"Like our ancestors, who fasted and vision-quested to find the guidance they needed to live a good life, students in school today have to conjure visions, establish goals and live them out," said Dianne Meili, Native liaison worker at Glengarry School in Peace River.

Her co-workers Pat Wanotch, liaison worker at Holy Family School in Grimshaw, and Louise Loyie at Good Shepherd, with the Alberta Native Education Project, have offered students a number of activities to learn about their culture, increase self-esteem and live the dream of high achievement.

" I teach students the Cree language and I also work in information about the history of Native people in Canada and help them make crafts like dream catchers and beaded key chains," said Loyie. At monthly assemblies she also tells legends and traditional stories to students.

"My stories have a moral to them," Loyie added. "They help the children learn the significance of respect and sharing in Native culture. I tell them about animal helpers and the spirit world. I tell them how important prayer is, too."

"We start every Monday morning with a Sweetgrass ceremony," said Meili. "Students and teachers come out to it and we start the week off on a positive note, praying for guidance form the Creator and asking for blessings for any students who might be having a hard time. We visualize ourselves ending up the week on Friday feeling good and like we've accomplished something."

At several school assemblies, Sweetgrass ceremonies and round dancing have been introduced to teachers, students and parents, and in December a special advent mass presentation was made.

"We're lucky to have a couple of students who are studying powwow dance, so they danced the grass dance and fancy dance while three other students played the drums for them," Meili explained. "The dancer's costumes were beautiful and it was a special experience in the hushed, spiritual atmosphere of the mass. The music and dance did a lot to promote positive Native awareness. I received a lot of good comments about it later."

Meili works with the teachers to introduce Native culture and crafts to students, as well.

"The Grade 8 social studies class was beginning to study Native peoples of Canada in December, and so we began with a couple of classes devoted to story telling and a guided visualization," said Meili. "The students closed their eyes and were lead back into time with a story that took them into a woodland Cree camp about 200 years ago."

A role-model program has been started , and last November Member of the Legislature Pearl Calahasen visited the Native students. She spoke about show she broke out of the stereotypical mold and completed university, became a teacher and then went into politics.

"It was a great 'how I made it big even though I was born in the bush' story," Meili said. Two students presented Calahasen with their Native artwork on cards and the politician seemed genuinely pleased with the hand-made gifts.