The Decolonization Working Group of the President’s Advisory Committee on Human Rights, Equity and Decolonization (PACHRED) is continuing its ongoing discussions at Brock concerning equitable treatment of Indigenous Peoples, with a focus this academic year on anti-racism and Indigenous children.

In accordance with this goal, the working group is hosting a series of talks that will keep Indigenous children at the forefront of conversations about of how racism, discrimination and oppressive measures have and still are affecting Indigenous Peoples.

On Tuesday, Jan. 12, from noon to 1 p.m. on Lifesize, the group will host an online panel to discuss the connection between land, food and child well-being.

The panel will be introduced by Liette Vasseur, Professor of Biological Sciences and UNESCO Chair in Community Sustainability: from local to global.

Vasseur’s remarks will be followed by mother-daughter duo Kitty R. Lynn and Adrianne Lickers Xavier, who were the driving force behind the Our Sustenance Program at Six Nations. The program addressed food security by growing food in a community garden and transmitting knowledge about growing food to the community, particularly through work with children. The program has now come to an end, but Lynn has continued many of its elements through Health Services at Six Nations, while Xavier is the Chair of Indigenous Studies at McMaster University.

The Jan. 12 gathering follows previous events held on Sept. 30 to commemorate Orange Shirt Day, which asked the community to remember the horrors of residential schools and the trauma still present in today’s society, as well as an Oct. 30 event that continued to focus on Orange Shirt Day and began a discussion about Brock’s participation in the Spirit Bear Ambearrister Program co-ordinated by the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society.

The Ambearrister program will guide Brock and the wider community through six steps that seek to make a difference for all First Nations, Aboriginal, Métis and Inuit children in Canada while also striving to honour the 2015 Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s (TRC) 94 Calls to Action.

To learn more or sign up for the event, please contact Decolonization Working Group Co-chair Lyn Trudeau at ltrudeau@brocku.ca or Co-chair Robyn Bourgeois at rbourgeois@brocku.ca