{"id":69540,"date":"2020-09-29T14:50:36","date_gmt":"2020-09-29T18:50:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsroom.carleton.ca\/?post_type=cu_story&p=69540"},"modified":"2025-10-18T16:52:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-18T20:52:15","slug":"osd-2020-survivors","status":"publish","type":"cu_story","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/story\/osd-2020-survivors\/","title":{"rendered":"Carleton Takes Part in Orange Shirt Day to Honour Residential School Survivors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n Carleton Takes Part in Orange Shirt Day to Honour Residential School Survivors\n <\/h1>\n \n <\/header>\n <\/div>\n\n \n <\/path>\n <\/path>\n <\/svg>\n <\/div>\n\n \n\n <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n

Philip Macho Commanda understands what it means to live with the history of Canada\u2019s residential schools. As a member of the Kitigan Zibi Anishnabeg band, both his grandmother and mother lived through the trauma of the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy sister and I were directly impacted by the residue of that,\u201d says Commanda, Carleton\u2019s Algonquin community liaison officer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat residue is passed down through generations and to their kids unknowingly. It\u2019s instilled in us that there is trauma and it is something you are born into.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Philip
Philip Macho Commanda<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

That trauma, and the events that caused it, will be remembered on Wednesday, Sept. 30 as part of Orange Shirt Day<\/a>. It was started in 2013 by Phyllis Webstad<\/a>, a survivor whose new orange shirt was taken away on her first day of residential school in British Columbia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two years later, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Canada’s Indian Residential Schools<\/a> described the treatment of approximately 150,000 Indigenous children and their families as a cultural genocide. The commission also documented the deaths of more than 6,000 of these students as a result of their school experience.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cSo many children never emerged from those schools and those who did experienced significant trauma,\u201d says Benny Michaud, director of Carleton\u2019s Centre for Indigenous Initiatives<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cOrange Shirt Day is an opportunity to acknowledge and honour residential school survivors, and also to look critically at how Indigenous knowledge, culture and ways of knowing are valued within post-secondary settings. This is important because it directly relates to Indigenous student well-being and academic success.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Benny
Benny Michaud, Director, Centre for Indigenous Initiatives<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In honour of Orange Shirt Day, fourth-year humanities and art history student Shaylin Allison, the centre\u2019s Indigenous student communications co-ordinator, is creating an information hub on the centre\u2019s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of my grandmothers was a residential school survivor, and my other grandmother had to be hidden in the bush along with her siblings so that they would not be taken,\u201d says Allison, who is from Garden River First Nation in Ontario.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMany people view the residential school system as something from the past, but the scars of colonial violence are still very real for many people. For this reason, I think it is important for my non-Indigenous peers, especially those at Carleton, to understand the context of the schools in our history and to have important discussions about them today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The recognition of Orange Shirt Day reflects Carleton\u2019s commitment to Indigenous reconciliation, as reflected in Kin\u00e0m\u00e0gawin<\/a>, a revitalized long-term Indigenous strategy with 41 calls to action to make Carleton a more welcoming space for current and future Indigenous students and faculty members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAmong the 41 Calls to Action outlined in the Kin\u00e0m\u00e0gawin<\/a> final report released in May, we see a desire for the increased incorporation of Indigenous ways of knowing to further reconciliation processes,\u2019\u2019 says Michaud. \u201cThe foundation of reconciliation is truth and honouring Orange Shirt Day at Carleton helps to promote that and raise awareness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carleton\u2019s commitment is also included in the Strategic Integrated Plan<\/strong>, which will be officially launched on Sept. 30. One of the tenets of the plan pledges that Carleton \u201cwill learn and take action together to achieve reconciliation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cCarleton has a responsibility to the Algonquin Anishinaabeg people within whose unceded, unsurrendered territory our campus is located,\u201d the plan states.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cWe will develop relationships based on mutual respect, accountability and reciprocity with Indigenous communities. We will take steps towards decolonization and seek reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

\"Carleton<\/figure>\n\n\n

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Philip Macho Commanda understands what it means to live with the history of Canada\u2019s residential schools. As a member of the Kitigan Zibi Anishnabeg band, both his grandmother and mother lived through the trauma of the system. \u201cMy sister and I were directly impacted by the residue of that,\u201d says Commanda, Carleton\u2019s Algonquin community liaison […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":410,"featured_media":69543,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"cu_story_type":[28,1931],"cu_story_tag":[1927],"class_list":["post-69540","cu_story","type-cu_story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","cu_story_type-community-partnerships","cu_story_type-social-innovation","cu_story_tag-indigenous"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":"blueprint"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/69540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/cu_story"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/410"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/69540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97619,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/69540\/revisions\/97619"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"cu_story_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story_type?post=69540"},{"taxonomy":"cu_story_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story_tag?post=69540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}