Caroline Cochrane

Again, that was one of the contentious issues that was brought, and that was why I came to standing committee, was when I had given a direction asking the NWT Status of Women to support me in having more women in the leadership. I was definitely told that that mandate is my mandate. It is not for the Status of Women to do, and that I need to do that. So what are we doing? We are doing the campaign schools. We're just finishing up the draft; I'll be sharing that fairly soon. We will be contracting with the Native Women's Association and the NWT Status of Women to actually do a pilot of those...

Again, as I stated the other day in answering that question, the Status of Women Council has been successful in accessing -- one of the mines has given them, I believe, either $8,000 or $9,000, and then they are also eligible for at least $5,000 through the Women's Initiative. That, in total, if I look at the lower of $8,000, that's actually a total of $13,000. If we were to honour four women, that would be probably about $3,000 per community. Traditionally, throughout my years of being a Minister here and going to events, usually it's about $500 that we give for a community feast, which...

Again, like I had said -- sorry, we just knocked over a basket -- the Indigenous language programming is offered not only to JK; it's also to all students, so the JK students are actually able to take part in the programming that's already being offered to the kindergarten students. I do want to point out that we have two communities, Fort Providence is one of them, and Behchoko, actually, that have more of an Indigenous immersion. Within Behchoko, it's JK, junior kindergarten, to grade two, full immersion, and then Fort Providence is junior kindergarten to grade three. I think those are fine...

We do have some resources already that we use within our schools. We are always redoing our resources. The same resources that we would use for kindergarten with our Indigenous languages will be used for junior kindergarten. A lot of that is actually having elders come in and speak with them and play with them, so the development of resources isn't always having a book. That is more of a western culture. Within an Indigenous culture, it's more storytelling, having elders coming in and speaking to the children and showing them concrete examples, so we try to incorporate both western culture and...

As one of my colleagues said the other day, I will do better than that. In fact, they are funded at 1:12, so if they are doing 1:25, Mr. Speaker, we have a bit problem. I'm going to be looking into that right away, because they are funded at 1:12.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The junior kindergarten program was piloted in some communities for a couple of years, and then this last year it was implemented across the Northwest Territories. There hasn't been a full assessment done on the total implementation, but we will be looking at it over the summer months, once the school year is finished, to find out what worked, what didn't work, and what we need to improve on. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, we are making significant progress in meeting this government's mandate commitments to strengthen the Northwest Territories post-secondary education system.

I am pleased to advise that the drafting of legislation to govern post-secondary education in the Northwest Territories is nearing completion. The proposed legislation will create, for the very first time, a process to ensure the effective governance and quality assurance of all post-secondary institutions operating in the territory.

This fulfills our mandate commitment to develop legislation ensuring a quality assurance system...

The schools are actually funded for 1:12. They're not funded 1:25, they're funded 1:12. I will look into the other things. Like I say, we'll do a review at the end of the year. I'm not going to be quick to say we'll throw money at things if it's not needed. What I am working on currently, though, is looking at, because we have a curriculum for JK, junior kindergarten, but I'm looking at strengthening the curriculum for childcare centres, licensed childcare centres, as well. I believe in equality and I believe in equity, and so we need to make sure that the services for children are similar...

I will have to look into that. My assumption was that all children who access either licensed childcare centres or junior kindergarten and school are recommended to have up-to-date immunizations, but I will look into that and get back to the Member on that.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to recognize our NWT Language Board members who decided to join us today. I am really glad to see you up there. We have Tammy Steinwand-Deschambeault, who is the chair. Excuse me if I get the names wrong. Jonas Landry, Emily Kudlak, Vance Sanderson, the vice-chair, Angie Lantz, Bella T'seleie, Betty Elias, Eleanor Mitchell-Firth, Linda Bussey, and Dr. Angela James is with them today. Welcome to everyone. It is important work you do. I am looking forward to meeting you this week.