Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about the bullying and how it is not part of the culture that I grew up in. It was more respect for the people and the culture. I want to ask the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment if the Education department is looking at how to include more Aboriginal teaching or mentoring programs that can be introduced into our education system that would look at more of respecting each other, respecting the environment and to prevent bullying.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We definitely don’t accept bullying in schools. Part of the going forward basis, I guess, there are certainly individuals that we heavily depend on. There are elders in the schools that we’re going to be introducing and, as the Member alluded to, Aboriginal-speaking teachers. Most of the students look up to their teachers, look up to their siblings, as well, older siblings. That is part of the plan with the Aboriginal Student Achievement Initiative, to introduce those individuals who are highly respected at the community level that can teach our children. That is the overall plan, long-term goals and objectives. We are exploring those areas as well.
I certainly look forward to the day when we can have elders into our schools. We worked on it long enough. I think the Minister is going to make an announcement, hopefully soon, that we’re going to have elders in our schools.
Getting back to how do we work with bullying, I know there are many other areas that we need to work on as a society as a whole. However, our children now spend most of their time in the schools Monday through Friday throughout the year. Can the Minister look at a program where possibly it could be a pilot project where the Aboriginal culture could be taught more forcefully, maybe introduced strongly to have this issue looked at from the Aboriginal perspective on bullying?
We do have certain programs in the school system that promote on-the-land programming and cultural orientation. We could do more in that respect. We do provide funding to the school boards to promote even more culture-based and community-based programming even at the school level. I can definitely share that with the board chairs with whom I have quarterly meetings and I can promote more of these types of important programs that should be delivered in the schools as well.
I was in Tulita when the students went out to do an on-the-land program, and the instructor said these students were just having fun and they were respecting each other because they depended on each other. But he said once they got back into the school system, they started to get a little more out of that respectable behaviour. I want to ask the Minister would he again look, with his colleagues, the boards, at whether we can put more of these types of programs more than just once or twice or three times a year, have these types of on-the-land programs that would be introduced into the education system?
As the Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment, I gave a directive to the school boards, because we provide funding for culture-based programs and we noticed some of the money wasn’t being expended thoroughly into the culture-based programming. There’s been a directive given, so the school boards are fully aware that we need to do more in those areas and utilizing the elders, utilizing the community members as expertise. We will continue to push that forward with the school boards as well.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Your final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister look at programs within the school, like I mentioned to my spouse, that maybe some type of organized program could be there to help the students develop into some wonderful athletes and look at their own self-esteem such as sport and recreation programs that could be used throughout the year?
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. That is one of the overall plans. We noticed there was an article in the South Slave Journal highlighting various programming, which highlighted me, as the Minister responsible, to work closely with the principals and the school boards, which we’ve done in the past and will continue to do, as well as working with Municipal and Community Affairs, working with Health and Justice. This is a collaborative approach when it comes to the wellness of all children of the Northwest Territories. That is our overall mandate. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.
