Denise Savoie

IN THE HOUSE: On aboriginal postsecondary education

Mr. Speaker, I recently had the honour of attending a graduation ceremony at the Friendship Centre in Victoria of aboriginal students and others who had completed a bridging program, since these were largely adults who had less schooling and found a way of coming back.

During the evening I spent a lot of time talking with many of them and I found out that they were saddled with huge debts. Does my colleague think that aboriginal people, adults and young people who want to go back to school, have the support they need?

The young people with whom I spoke that evening were interested in going up north to Alert Bay do a traditional trip as part of the completion of their program and to get a better understanding of their own culture.

Could the member talk a bit about what exists in terms of first nations post-secondary education, institutions and programs. […]

[Translation]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate on aboriginal post-secondary education in Canada. As the NDP critic for post-secondary education, I am aware of many problems in Canada's post-secondary education system and also the solutions that many of us have proposed since this session began.

Tonight I would like to talk specifically about the problem facing Canada's first nations.

I should mention that in 10 minutes I will be sharing my time with the member for Halifax.
[English]
We know, for example, that 70% of jobs in Canada require post-secondary education. We know that among the general population, 30% of Canadian students say that financial considerations are crucial to them in their decisions not to acquire post-secondary education. I can only imagine what it is among first nations people.

As the speaker before me has said, first nations have the largest growing population in Canada, the largest number of young people in Canada and largest unemployment level in Canada. We know that completion of high school is very low and there are undoubtedly many historic and present social conditions that are the cause of it.

I was very disappointed in reading the response of the government to this report. In the letter the minister mentions doing more studies. It seems discouraging at this point from what we have heard from colleagues opposite and my colleague, whom I thank for raising this issue, which is such an essential debate in Canada. Responding to the problem and to the facts that we already have by proposing yet more studies is a very discouraging response indeed.

I have said that we know what some of the solutions are. In my riding a story was written up in the local newspaper of a woman who had a young child and was lucky enough to win the battle against illiteracy. She began with very low levels of literacy and decided she would not to pass on those same problems to her child. She approached Project Literacy Victoria to help her overcome some of the reading and writing problems she was facing. That was six years ago. She is now reading novels and looking forward to continuing her post-secondary education.

When I say we know what some of the solutions are and when I look at the response of the government earlier this year in cutting important programs for literacy, this is beyond understanding.

Project Literacy Victoria is one of the groups that has offered programs, which have helped hundreds and hundreds of people, aboriginal and white, to move on, take their lives back in their own hands and get further education. I know this does not address the issue of post-secondary education, but we talked about some of the causes around post-secondary education, and they begin with basic literacy programs. By cutting these programs, the Conservative government has done a large disservice not only to aboriginal people but to the general population that faces these issues.

We know also that one of the recommendations is to remove the 2% funding cap. By itself, this 2% funding cap has prevented thousands of aboriginal people from moving on to post-secondary education. Yet the government responds by talking about more studies. It is as simple as removing this cap to allow many of the students who are now struggling to get through school to do so.

Recently I had the pleasure of attending a graduation of students who had completed a bridging program. They were aboriginal students who had left school for one reason or another and who had now completed a bridging program, allowing them to continue on to university.

Many of these students were facing huge debts. These programs have proven themselves to be very successful. I look at the first nations program, which is offered at Camosun College in Victoria, that offers services and programs for first nations, Métis, Inuit and native American students.

This program offers cultural support to students who are outside their community. It also offers academic support in programs such as family support workers, first nations home support or residential care attendant program or in health support as well. It also provides experience and dedicated first nations instructors.

Yet we know that since 1993, transfers for education to universities have been cut across Canada, not only programs through Indian and Northern Affairs but programs generally for post-secondary education. These cuts have affected the possibility of offering the kinds of programs that exist at Camosun College and that could exist in many other places.

For example, in 1997 only 6% of aboriginals in my province of British Columbia applied to university, compared to the non-aboriginal rate of 29%. Currently their university participation rate edged up to 9.1%. In contrast, the university participation rate among non-aboriginals rose to 34%. This speaks to a real gap in our system, that we are allowing our first nations to stay behind.

In the process of the employability study that we are presently doing, it has become clear that we cannot allow such a large segment of our population to simply fall by the wayside. We must take action.

It is past the time for studies. There are solutions. My colleague, the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan, has proposed many of them specific to first nations and so have we in terms of the post-secondary education in general.

I urge the government to consider these, rather than spend more time with studies. […]

Mr. Speaker, I remember well one of the ministers of the Conservative government talking about adult literacy programs and about cutting the fat. We are all aware that there is a pattern in families. If we look at the cause of illiteracy in children, we often find parents who have really difficult issues.

Raising the issue of mismanagement was just simply out of order, when we consider the growth in the young population, the increased costs of administering the programs and the need for culturally appropriate post-secondary education. I talked about the excellent post-secondary program that exists in our area, which is managed very efficiently. Aboriginal students are graduating from that program.

Those are the kinds of programs that would turn things around if more funding was available. […]

Throughout our study on employability, it became obvious that we could not leave segments of the population behind. The social and economic costs are too high. It is time to pay attention to all of these.

First nations really appreciate the apprenticeship model. Without categorizing or profiling, it seems to respect their way of learning. Finding ways of both encouraging apprenticeships and ensuring completion of apprenticeships on reserves would really be a big first step toward solving the problem.

To read the full debate, click here.