Aboriginal education conference well-received here

A conference on aboriginal education held here earlier this month was the first of its kind and saw a great response, said co-organizer Mike Cameron.
“It went fantastic,” he enthused.
The Anishnaabeg of Kabapikotawangag Resource Council Inc. partnered with Absolute Training and Development in Winnipeg to bring the conference to this area.
Cameron, president of Absolute Training and Development, said there’s an annual conference on aboriginal education in Winnipeg, but this was the first held in Fort Frances.
The conference, called “Roots of Behaviour—Working Conference on Education,” was held at Fort Frances High School and Confederation College from May 3-6.
“Our numbers were lower than what we had hoped for, but our participants got a lot out of it,” noted Cameron, who grew up in Fort Frances. “There was lots of sharing of information.”
Eighty participants attended a number of workshops and keynote addresses, including Lac La Croix Chief Larry Jourdain, who discussed the causes of social aggression in aboriginal communities as well as strategies to deal with it.
Susan Buchanan, founder of Clarion Consulting in Halifax, N.S., spoke about bullying and how to stop it, while Stuart Auty, founding president of the Canadian Safe School Network, talked about safe schools.
Dr. Frances Li stepped in for Dr. Kathy Jones, who was unable to make her presentation on fetal alcohol syndrome due to a family emergency. Dr. Li’s talk was entitled “Incorporating Harm Reduction Philosophy in Aboriginal Communities.”
There also were a number of workshops dealing with youth suicide, gang participation, and integration into public schools.
“Our goal really was to help try to bridge aboriginal education, on-reserve and off-reserve, by sharing some great information,” said Cameron. “To tell people about practices that are working in other parts of the country so they can be implemented locally.”
The majority of the conference participants were educators, but there also were representatives from youth services, health care, and social services. “Anybody working with young people,” Cameron noted.
Cameron said he was encouraged by the response and hopes to hold a similar event again next year.
“Based on our feedback, which has been really positive, people are requesting we do something again,” he noted, though adding the location may be moved to Kenora or Dryden next time.