Disappointment in rejection of Indigenous name for school

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This article was published 04/02/2020 (2078 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

THE Seven Oaks School Division board has decided not to rename École Templeton, despite suggestions from the community the yet-to-open school be given an Indigenous title in the spirit of reconciliation.

On Monday night, trustees voted unanimously to refer all future school naming and renaming decisions to the division’s policy committee.

The decision came one week after a delegation of Indigenous and non-Indigenous educators, parents and students asked trustees to give the school an Indigenous title.

“We’ve got a practice that is probably 20 years of not naming schools after people, naming them after the street they’re on or the neighbourhood they’re in,” said superintendent Brian O’Leary.

“They’re affirming that decision, but referring it to policy for the future.”

Located on Templeton Avenue between Pipeline Road and McPhillips Street, the new French-immersion grade school will follow suit with the Seven Oaks standard. The avenue’s name, however, can be traced back to pioneer William Templeton, who once owned the land that has become Kildonan Golf Course.

The school is expected to open to 450 kindergarten to Grade 5 students in the fall and alleviate crowding at community schools including Amber Trails, A.E. Wright, James Nisbet, and Constable Edward Finney.

Mary Courchene, the division’s elder-in-residence, said Tuesday she met the board’s decision “with a little disappointment.” A long-time educator, Courchene spoke in favour of an Indigenous name at the Jan. 27 board meeting. She cited the importance of validating Indigenous cultures as “viable” and reflecting the division’s community in its school signage.

While much of Seven Oaks is located in Winnipeg North, the school itself is in the Kildonan—St. Paul federal riding — where about 10 per cent of the population identifies as Indigenous.

“I’m 100 per cent positive that there will be another time and that we will be able to do it. After all, we’re in that era of education where our voices are now being heard,” said Courchene, a member of Sagkeeng First Nation.

She added it’s always difficult to be the first to challenge the status quo.

None of the names of Seven Oaks schools currently recognize the history, culture or contributions of Indigenous peoples. Although, its land-based learning centre is known as both Ozhaawashkwaa Animikii-Bineshi Aki Onji Kinimaagae’ Inun and Blue Thunderbird Land-based Teachings Learning Centre.

O’Leary said he hopes the division’s Indigenous programming speaks to its commitment to reconciliation.

He added the division typically considers a school to be “the centre of a neighbourhood, so it has a neighbourhood name.” That’s where many of its schools, including Maples Collegiate, Amber Trails School and West Kildonan Collegiate, among others, got their names.

“When we’re looking at naming places after places, we have to remember that our history as it’s currently presented is very recent and not fully reflective of the history that exists on this land,” said Ry Moran, director of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation at the University of Manitoba.

“In fact, becoming much more aware of, respectful of, conscious of those long histories and the many contributions that Indigenous languages and people have made to Canadian society is very much at the heart of reconciliation efforts.”

Frank Deer, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Education and an associate professor of education at the U of M, said discourse about renaming institutions in Winnipeg has changed drastically since he moved to the city 20 years ago from Kahnawake, a First Nation south of Montreal.

Deer spoke Tuesday about reconciliation as a journey towards a new relationship. “That requires discussion. It requires mutual understanding. It requires people to be honest with one another about their feelings or views and what informs those views,” he said.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @macintoshmaggie