The only First Nations University in 'Canada', located in Saskatchewan is about to be shut down. The Harper Government is hitting Aboriginal Programs hard, the Native Women's Shelter of Montréal is also being thrown a slap in the face - their funding is being cut 2 years earlier than expected. Goes to show that the apology for residential schools and their legacies was more of a piece of necessary politic than a concrete step towards reconciliation.
Finding out about this threat of closure due to lack of federal funding really made me wonder about the role of University education, something I do from time to time ever since I read an essay by E. O. Wilson entitled 'What is Education For?' discussing, among other things, how it was the most highly educated who were promoting the cutting of our forests and the polluting of our rivers.
What is and is not valued in academia reflects to an extent what the social structure of 'Canada' really hopes for its Indigenous people. Not higher education and empowerment. Not good health, as most toxic waste facilities are allocated to (or to very nearby) Reserve land, and we all witnessed Parliament send up body bags when First Nations communities asked for help with H1N1 last spring. Not to confer with First Nations on policy issues as would be expected were the government to sign on to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Not a re-opening of land claims, to return some land back that was stolen... the only conclusion I can come to when I add it all up, is an ongoing attempt by Canada towards continued conquest and takeover, aka a continuation of the colonization project.
When I spoke with some people who knew more about First Nations University, they told me that it was a case of poor management and improper use of funds. One woman told me that the board of directors was run by band council politicians who are simply incompetent at running the finances of an organization. She could understand why the govt. was getting fed up - but still ceded that it was a true shame. She was also a proponent of autonomy in funding - in her organization they put a portion of whatever funding they receive into endowment.
Anyway, mismanagement aside, the First Nations University is a necessary pillar of education. IF it were to close, all those who had received their diplomas from this University would no longer be credited for their educations. The validation of native knowledge that this University provided would be relegated to outside of the Institutional University framework, except in small corners like Concordia's Interdisciplinary Studies program, where one can study Native Studies only as part and parcel of a larger curriculum. education or incarceration?
