Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, after our public briefing this morning with Aurora College, I want to speak further about the community learning centres because there remains so much misunderstanding and confusion as to what has been happening at the CLCs, what the vision for starting them was in the first place, and then what is the path forward that communities have been trying to sketch out.
The community learning centres are rooted in an initiative started by Frontier College in the 1960s and '70s and was rooted in a philosophy of community development. So that means providing opportunities for all community members to learn and gain skills that are important to them and be empowered in their lives and their self-governance. But over time, as these centres were taken under the wing of Aurora College, the focus narrowed towards upgrading, so focusing on credits people failed to get in high school or things they failed to learn well enough. And it was oriented towards anyone who's available between 9 to 5, so often the unemployed folks.
In some cases, attendance did dwindle and some centres stagnated. But other centres have revitalized themselves through partnerships and have lots of important programs happening that it seems much of the Aurora College leadership, that's based on the campuses, don't seem to be aware of.
In our meeting this morning, an example was offered of a centre in N'dilo and Dettah offering hands-on programs to over a hundred students in trades and various certifications. The response from the college was well, that's a partnership with the Yellowknives Dene so it's not really a college program. But the point is that those are exactly the kinds of partnerships that the CLCs could and should be doing more of to be successful. And that was exactly the recommendation of the What We Heard report that was completed last year for the college and ECE that's recently been published online.
We were told this morning over and over again the world is going digital. But my first reaction was, so why have you gone down and shut down the computer literacy classes at the Literacy Outreach Centre in Yellowknife then?
Saying that the future of learning is online is completely out of touch. It's tone deaf to what is going on now at the community level, the kinds of hands-on learning that communities have been asking for and, frankly, it reveals a lack of imagination and vision.
Through the facilities master plan process, the concept arose for CLCs to become vibrant, community-driven spaces, and hubs for collaboration. I am hopeful they could still become just that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Members' statements. Member from the Deh Cho.
