Jackson Lafferty

I have given specific directive to the school boards on Aboriginal programming. The funding that we provide, we want specifically for on-the-land programs to deal with cultural and language preservation. Those are areas that we continue to monitor. We work closely with the school boards as well. Part of the residential school curriculum that we’ve developed has been very positive to date. It is very preliminary right now. We just wrote it out in October 2012. We’re getting a lot of positive feedback. That is reflecting on the northern perspective. There is also a social studies program that we...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. When we talk about the Education system in the Northwest Territories, it covers everyone in the Northwest Territories. The Aboriginal content the Member is referring to, I need to get the detailed stats on that. I don’t have it in front of me but I can provide it to Members.

Mr. Speaker, today is the official Anti-Bullying Day, a day celebrated during the last Wednesday of February of each year. I am pleased we are wearing pink carnations today, marking a day of protest against bullying. This action was started by two brave young men in Nova Scotia, David Shepherd and Travis Price, who gave away 50 pink shirts after a Grade 9 student was bullied for wearing a pink shirt to school.

These two young men raised national awareness of a significant societal problem that does not just exist in our schools but is all too common in our society generally. It is a cancer that...

Mahsi, Madam Chair. I would just like to thank the Members for their comments. There are a lot of important comments pertaining to this budget and a lot of areas for long-term strategies as well.

First of all, there was a discussion on Sachs Harbour boarding and so forth. I believe part of the discussion that we had regarding e-learning is that is the way to go now. There’s been a question whether there will be an investment in eLearning and why we didn’t see it in the budget. This is a brand new area that we are exploring. I’d like to see us invest in those areas the next business planning...

Yes, I do, Mr. Chair.

This particular area has been a key point of our discussion. It took a bit of time to get here. We want to have somewhat of a perfect system where elders are in the schools, and how we can get around where they’re being penalized if we pay them and they get the clawback from their federal pension, federal old age security and so forth. That’s what we’ve been trying to work out. I’m happy to say that we’ve finalized that area and we want to deliver elders in schools as part of our team within the schools starting this fall school year. That’s our target date. I want to see the elders. Obviously...

Part of the education renewal I talked about in particular in this House, there are six different pillars. One of the pillars is the small schools, how we can provide further enhancing the programing into the schools and the funding formula attached to that. Obviously, there will be numerous discussions pertaining to that Aboriginal content. The smallest communities, when we talk about capital and programming and so forth, it’s all based on enrolment. I have instructed my department to look thoroughly about how we can improve that programming. We will be focusing on the small community schools...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. [English translation not provided.]

I’d just like to welcome the N.J. Macpherson students that are here, all the students that are wearing pink. It’s a great day to wear pink. And all the supporters who are here with us in the gallery as well, mahsi cho for coming.

I have to work with various groups, whether it be the Safety Committee, the WSCC, the Governance Council, and also my colleague in Nunavut. It’s just a process that we’re going through. I realize that it is taking some time. Again, it is a complex issue but once it’s in my deliverance, then I need to consult with my colleague in Nunavut and possibly tabling the document, then we can move forward on the complex document that’s before us.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First, I would like to commend those individuals who have been involved with providing input into this. It’s a very comprehensive and complex regulation system that is before us. There has been some input and amendments to the regulations themselves. Right now, as it stands, I have forwarded that to WSCC Board of Governors. They are meeting in early March in Iqaluit. They are going to be reviewing that and they will provide recommendations back to me. From there I need to work with the Nunavut Minister responsible for WSCC, my colleague. From there we need to move...