School of Native Studies celebrates first 10 years

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Anniversaries never fail to be a time for celebration and for reminiscing as was the case with the 10th anniversary of the University of Alberta's School of Native Studies in Edmonton.

The formal occasion, a Dec. 4 banquet at the Coast Terrace Hotel, attracted hundreds of former and current students, grads, staff and supporters from Canada and the United States.

Special guest and presenter was Syncrude President Eric Newell, who also serves as Chair of the University Board of Governors. He praised the program which has mushroomed from a mere 24 students in 1988 to more than 220 today.

According to past director James Dempsey, the idea for a School of Native Studies went back to the early 1970s when a Senate task force researched the concept, one pitched earlier by the Indian Association of Alberta. The university subsequently established the Office of the Advisor of Native Affairs, later renamed Native Student Services, in 1976, with Marilyn Buffalo-McDonald as its first director. Her successors included Ed Metatawabin, Reanna Erasmus-Sayers, Dr. Carl Urion, Jane Martin and the present director, Art Beaver. A proposal to establish a School of Native Studies was then presented to the General Faculties Council and received approval in 1984.

Two of the first staff members were Cree instructor Emily Hunter and administrative assistant Jane Martin.

The current director of the School of Native Studies, Frank Tough, explains Native Studies as "an examination of Native histories, their relationships and philosophies, and more." Such programs, he said, "incorporates the past which is needed to explain the present and used to focus on the future."

Program expansion is a never-ending pursuit with the school taking an interdisciplinary approach and seeking co-operation from other faculties.

Tough thinks some of the school program's major accomplishments include establishing the Cree language courses as well as the strong community involvement, university curriculum, greater support from the university's higher levels, and the fact that morale is high with the staff working together well.

"There haven't been big leaps or flashy things," he adds. Rather, "incremental progress," has and continues to occur.

So where does the program rank when compared with other Canadian universities? Tough believes Alberta's is one of the best with the potential to get bigger and better, especially since Alberta is "coming out of the fiscal crisis."

Many of Canada's larger universities don't have Native Studies or First Nations programs, he said. Trent University in Ontario and the University of Saskatchewan do, he said.

Tough said Alberta needs to implement a graduate studies level. In the meantime, he feels the school is progressive but the absence of graduate programs is a deterrent to some people who aspire to higher levels of academic achievement.

He wants to see the school's full-time faculty grow from five to 10 or 15 using educators capable of instructing methods, language, history, politics, justice, humanities, drama, literature, art and urbanization.