Chris Scribe is a longtime educator in Saskatoon. He was raised on the Prairies by his Nakoda grandmother, whom he lovingly refers to as a “Jedi master” for her mental strength, wisdom and resilience. She held onto her Nakoda culture in spite of her childhood years in residential school and was able to pass it on to Scribe and other family members.

“She wanted to make sure she raised somebody who was proud of who they were,” says Scribe, who is from Carry the Kettle Nakoda Nation in Saskatchewan and Norway House Cree Nation in northern Manitoba. “I was really blessed to be raised that way.”

Now a teacher himself, Scribe sees firsthand the transformational impact that being taught Indigenous knowledge has on First Nations, Inuit and Métis young people — especially those who haven’t had a chance to learn about their culture like he did.

“By standing in front of a classroom and sharing Indigenous ways of knowing, what we’re doing is allowing our students to walk on a path of decolonization. … Our people are starving for that,” he says. “We’re feeding their souls and reconnecting them holistically to who they are. That’s what an Indigenous teacher, armed with all of that beautiful knowledge, can do for an Indigenous kid.”

For non-Indigenous students, the same knowledge can break down misconceptions they may have about Indigenous Peoples as a result of colonialism and change their ways of thinking about the lands they live on and their history. Unfortunately, Indigenous teachers who enter the public education system “are in a constant battle,” says Scribe. “We are constantly fighting to make sure that Indigenous knowledge is put on the same level — eye to eye — with non-Indigenous knowledge, to say, ‘look, we can benefit from this; our systems can benefit from this.’”

Scribe says in his experience, one of the reasons why many Indigenous people haven’t flourished in post-secondary institutions is because those systems usually aren’t built for them to succeed unless they assimilate into the colonial norm. Eurocentric ideas of achievement often don’t align with the more holistic nature of Indigenous worldviews, something that can result in people needing to leave a part of themselves at the door when entering post-secondary education. Adding to that, people in remote communities usually must relocate, which adds to the culture shock (and financial burden) of attending university.

Scribe graduated in 2005 from the University of Saskatchewan’s Indian Teacher Education Program — one of the most successful and long-running programs of its kind. Scribe chalks his success up to the safe environment created for budding Indigenous educators to thrive within. The program hosts cohorts on-reserve so people can learn without leaving their communities. It also encourages its students to learn about and share their cultures.

“It was really one of the spaces where I felt safe and able to be who I was and succeed in a system that isn’t always open to Indigenous people,” Scribe says. “You know, we need to create that space and create those changemakers, and teacher education programs that are Indigenous across this country, that’s their goal … to make sure our students go in there with a strong sense of who they are.”

The importance of the advisory council, he says, “is that everybody’s coming together as equals. When they come together to talk about Indigenous teacher education, they’re all passionate about the future of their communities and willing to lend their advice and experience and direction on how things could go and how we can tackle different challenges.”

Andrea Brazeau is Inuk from Kangiqsualujjuaq, Nunavik, and was part of the advisory council until this past spring. She works at the Ulluriaq School in her home community. Kangiqsualujjuaq is small, and when Brazeau returned with her teaching degree from McGill University’s department of integrated studies in education in 2021, the community celebrated her with a fire truck parade. She taught Grade 3 and Grade 4 and has since moved into a support worker role at the school after seeing a need for more social and emotional support for students. As an educator, she tries to pass along as many cultural teachings as she can to the children in her community — taking them out on the land as much as possible and speaking to them in Inuktitut. During culture classes, students will go out to hunt geese, or an Elder will teach them how to gut a seal.

“A lot of the students I worked with had low self-esteem. They were afraid to make mistakes in the classroom,” says Brazeau. “Once you bring those kids out on the land, it’s a completely different version of that person. They become their authentic selves. There’s less anxiety, less stress.”