Ry Moran, director of the new National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NRCTR), based at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, will be in Thompson March 11 for the launch of the centre’s community engagement sessions in Lecture Theatre Room 302A at the University College of the North’s new Thompson campus at 55 UCN Dr., adjacent to the Thompson Regional Community Centre (TRCC).
More community engagement sessions are scheduled for The Pas on March 12; Iqaluit on March 19; Vancouver on March 25; Prince George. B.C. on March 26; Montreal on March 31; Saskatoon on April 16; Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia on April 21; Edmonton on May 5 and Toronto on May 15.
Moran will meet with survivors of Indian residential schools here in Thompson Wednesday between 5 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. and inter-generational survivors between 7 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. Health supports will be available on site and refreshments and a light supper will be provided.
Moran wants to learn what Northern Manitoba survivors’ “hopes and dreams” are for the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation.
Establishing a national research centre and archive to forever preserve the truths of Canada’s Indian Residential Schools was one of the most important responsibilities given to the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission. As part of its legal mandate, the responsibility is spelled out in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, signed in 2007 by representatives of survivors, aboriginal groups, including the Assembly of First Nations (AFM) and Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK), the federal government and the churches.
In order to carry out the national research centre and archive part of its mandate, the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission convened an international gathering of experts on aboriginal community control, and on national and international principles, protocols and best practices for indigenous and human rights archiving.
The National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation has a 10-person staff and is located in Chancellor’s Hall at 177 Dysart Rd. on the University of Manitoba’s Winnipeg campus. It will work in co-operation with a wide network of partners across Canada and is set to officially open this summer. Current partner organizations include the University College of the North; University of British Columbia; Lakehead University;University of Winnipeg; Red River College; Université de Saint-Boniface; St John College; St Paul’s College;Legacy of Hope Foundation; National Association of Friendship Centre’s; Canadian Museum for Human Rights; Archives Manitoba; Manitoba Museum; Centre for Indigenous Environmental Resources and the Sandy-Saulteaux Spiritual Centre.
The National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation will operate within the academic and administrative structure of the University of Manitoba with Moran reporting administratively to the office of vice-president (research and international), as he manages the day-to-day operations of the centre.
The centre was established in a June 21, 2013 National Aboriginal Day agreement between the university and the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which will wind up its six-year mandate in June. The centre’s archives will hold millions of documents collected by the commission including nearly 7,000 video-and audio-recorded statements from survivors, inter-generational survivors, and others affected by the schools and their legacy; millions of archival documents and photographs from more than 20 departments of the Government of Canada and nearly 100 Canadian church entities archives; works of art, artifacts and other expressions of reconciliation presented at Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission events; and research collected and prepared by the commission. Justice Murray Sinclair, who chairs the three-member commission, has said the research centre is an important part of the commission’s legacy.
The National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation is guided by a seven-member governing circle, who have two-year terms. The current members are Eugene Arcand; Andrew Carrier; Catherine Cook; Grand Chief Edward John; Gregory Juliano; Cynthia Wesley-Esquimaux; and Jennifer Watkins.
The governing circle ensures Indigenous control over the materials held by the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation. It provides guidance on the centre’s policies, priorities, and activities, on ceremonies and protocols, on methods and sources to expanding the center’s holdings and resources and on prospective partners.
Three members of the governing circle represent survivors, their families or ancestors (one First Nation, one Inuit and one Métis), two represent the University of Manitoba, and two represent the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation partner organizations. At all times, at least four members of the governing circle must identify as aboriginal.
Moran was appointed director of the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation on Feb. 3, 2014, coming directly from the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission, where had served as director of statement gathering since January 2010.
Before joining the commission, Moran, who is Métis, was the founder and president of YellowTilt Productions, delivering services in a variety of areas including aboriginal language presentation and oral history. He had hosted internationally broadcast television programs, produced national cultural events, and written and produced original music for children’s television. Moran’s awards including a National Aboriginal Role Model Award, and a Canadian Aboriginal Music Award. Moran is a Masters of Business Administration candidate, and holds a Bachelor of Arts undergraduate degree from the University of Victoria.
The first Indian residential schools opened in the 1880s in western Canada and eventually, they operated in every province and territory except Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and Newfoundland. The system was at its height in the 1920s with compulsory attendance under the Indian Act and over 80 schools in operation. Most Indian residential schools were run by entities of the Roman Catholic church, with others run by the Anglican, Presbyterian, Methodist and later the United churches.
Here in Northern Manitoba and Saskatchewan, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Keewatin-Le Pas was involved in four residential schools at Beauval, Sturgeon Landing, Guy Hill and Cross Lake. Through the Corporation of Catholic Entities Party to the Indian Residential Schools Settlement (CCEPIRSS), created in 2006 to oversee the undertakings of the group of 54 Catholic dioceses and religious congregations under the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement (IRSSA), the Archdiocese of Keewatin-Le Pas was obliged to provide $1 million in cash over five years, $1.6 million of in-kind services and community work over 10 years, as well as support the fundraising Canada Wide Campaign (CWC).
The archdiocese met that obligation by paying out $200,000 a year, beginning in 2007 until the $1 million was paid. The Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement ended litigation facing the federal government and the four churches that ran the schools, where rampant abuse occurred, for more than a century, and which former Archbishop Sylvain Lavoie, who resigned for health reasons July 16, 2012, called, “a system that is now acknowledged as a flawed policy of colonization and assimilation.”
In a Dec. 17, 2009 pastoral letter, Lavoie wrote: ” We would encourage those from our archdiocese who attended the schools, or had family members and relatives who attended, to contribute to the [Truth and Reconciliation Commission] process, so that the historical record can be accurate. Whereas over the past few years many held back from sharing positive experiences out of fear of being politically incorrect, now is the time to speak your truth so that it is heard and recorded.”
The Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission, in its current incarnation, was appointed by the federal Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper through orders-in-council on June 9, 2009.
The Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission was originally established on June 1, 2008. Ontario Court of Appeal Justice Harry LaForme, a member of the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation in Southern Ontario, was appointed by the Harper government as the first commission chair, but resigned in October 2008. Claudette Dumont-Smith, of Gatineau, Que., a native health expert, and Jane Brewin Morley, of Victoria, a lawyer and public policy adviser, were also appointed originally as commissioners, but announced in January 2009 that they would resign, too, effective June 1, 2009, leading to the entire three-person commission to be replaced by the current commissioners.
The chair, Manitoba Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Murray Sinclair, from near Selkirk, was Manitoba’s first aboriginal judge. Sinclair was appointed associate chief judge of the provincial court of Manitoba in March 1988 and elevated to the Court of Queen’s Bench in January 2001.
Commissioner Wilton Littlechild is a member of the Ermineskin Tribe Cree community, near Hobbema in central Alberta. He was the first Treaty First Nation person to acquire his law degree from the University of Alberta in 1976. His law firm is located on the Ermineskin reserve. He also served as a Progressive Conservative MP for the Alberta riding of Wetaskiwin from 1988 to 1993.
Commissioner Marie Wilson grew up in Sarnia in Southern Ontario. Wilson, who lives in Yellowknife, is a well-known former CBC broadcast journalist and manager, who spent most of her career in the North, and is a member of the United Church. She served as CBC’s senior manager for northern Quebec and the three northern territories of Nunavut, the Northwest Territories and the Yukon.
A component of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, the commission is an independent body that oversees a process to provide former students and anyone who has been affected by the residential schools legacy, with an opportunity to share their individual experiences in a safe and culturally appropriate manner.
The Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission is unique from other commissions around the world in that its scope is primarily focused on the experiences of children. Its focus of research spans more than 150 years, one of the longest durations ever examined.
It is also the first court-ordered truth commission to be established in Canada. As such, the court plays an ongoing role in the implementation and supervision of the commission.
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