SUBMITTED PHOTO
Students at St. Michael's School dressed in their orange shirts on Monday, Sept. 30, 2019 as part of a nation-wide initiative to commemorate the horrors of residential schools.
jappel@medicinehatnews.com@MHNJeremyAppel
Medicine Hat’s public and separate schools marked Orange Shirt Day with assemblies Monday commemorating the horrors of residential schools and looking forward to a future of reconciliation.
Medicine Hat Catholic Board of Education First Nations, Métis and Inuit support co-ordinator Raevon Gehring says the orange shirts students and staff wore to school symbolize all that was taken away from Indigenous people when they were forced into residential schools.
“It’s an important part of Canadian culture and the history of Canada, and so when it comes to education, we would like to educate the students about the past, and thus doing that, we do not repeat the past in those negative manners,” said Gehring.
“Once those students are aware of residential schools and can identify the effects of it, that would build compassion and the change of a mind frame, changing Canada into a better country.”
Medicine Hat College Indigenous student specialist David Restoule spoke to students at George Davison School in a morning assembly.
“We’re just acknowledging all the ancestors who came before us,” Restoule said, referring to people who survived residential schools and those who didn’t.
“I’m really proud today to see all the orange shirts here and I’m happy that you’re all able to come out and be part of this with us today.”
Grade 5 George Davison student Ava Pearson, who is herself Plains Cree, says Orange Shirt Day is a “good way to show love through the whole school and whole world.”
Pearson’s family attended the ceremony in traditional Indigenous garb, speaking to her fellow students before leading them in a traditional round dance, with participants holding hands and walking clockwise in a circle, just as the sun rises and sets.
“I like the way people were spending time with each other,” she said.
The origins of Orange Shirt Day lie with Phyllis Webstad, who wore an orange shirt her family gave her as a parting gift when she was forced into a residential school, which “was stripped from her when she arrived,” Gehring explained.
“She had recurring memories of that orange shirt and the importance in how she felt really wonderful in it (contrasted with) coming to a residential school, where she was stripped of her culture.”
As George Davison vice principal Tricia Unreiner put it to the students, “the school wanted her to be like everyone else and they took away that orange shirt, and it wasn’t very nice. Lots of kids weren’t treated very nicely and they had to move away from their homes.”
Note: This story has been updated to correct “shirts” in the second paragraph. It was originally printed as another word, one that shouldn’t be in a family newspaper.
