Federal, provincial and territorial strategies for Canadian native education, 1960–1970

Federal, provincial and territorial strategies for Canadian native education, 1960-1970 JOHN W. CHALMERS The Problem During the latter years of the nineteenth and early part of the present century, popular wisdom had it that Canadian aborigines, Indian and Metis, were a vanishing race. Therefore any efforts to provide them with good education and make a place for rt:hem in Canadian society were destined to be futile. This attitude was enhanced by the fact that they were largely an invisible people. In an increasingly urbanized society they were sequestered on Indian Reserves or Metis Colonies or were squatters on crown land in the northern forest. Almost the only ones concerned with their education were the mission·aries, more interested in saving their souls than in rt:raining their minds and bodies. These native people, however, were not destined to the extinction that overtook Newfoundland 's Beothuks. From 1880 to 1940, the registered Canadian Indian population was fairly constant, fluctuating around 100,000 to 120,000; the Metis probably also held their own. But beginning in the 1940's, the native population expanded dramatically. This growth was not, as with the concurrent white increase, a result of the baby boom during and after World War II, for the native birth rate had always been phenomenally hi9h, more than twice the usual white rate. Rather, the growth was due to a number of developments which cut the infant mortality rate drastically. These included the creation of new wonder drugs, such as sulfa and antibiotics, increase in public health services, including in Alberta free maternal hospitalization beginning about 1940, and family allowances from 1945. Thus by 1960, the Indian school system was showing severe strains. The following table indicates Indian school enrolments in Alberta from 1937. Journal of Canadian Studies TABLE I /ND/AN SCHOOL ENROLMENTS IN ALBERTA 1 Year 1937 1949 1957 1960 1966 1970 No. of Students 1,986 2,267 4,887 7,493 7,916 9,588 Since the Metis are not registered or so classified in any census, it is impossible to know how rapid was the increase in their school registrations, but it may be assumed to be comparable to that of the Indians. As a result of the rapid growth in the native population and school enrolments, educational authorities, both federal and provincial , were faced with a two-fold problem. Its first and most immediate aspect was to increase school facilities and at a time when teacher shortages, especially for marginally desirable positions, were still very acute. The second and long-term part of the problem was that the native enclaves - Indian Reserves , Metis Colonies, tiny settlements on crown land - were finite in their economic resources but unlimited in their potential populations. Inevitably, within a fixed number of years, many denizens of these rural ghettoes would have to leave - that, or subsist on soul-destroying welfare. But the education they were receiving in no way prepared them to cope with the white man's world. Thus the problem was not only to furnish schooling for more children but also to provide them with a different and better education. The Administrative Personnel The provincial governments, with theiir cadres of experienced and well-trained inspector /superintendents, were well staffed to meet the burgeoning demands of native education; the federal government was not. In the mid-fifties, for example, Indian Affairs 37 had only one school superintendent for each of the four western provinces. Ten years later in Alberta the number had increased to six, in addition to other professional educators in staff positions. In other provinces a similar situation prevailed. Filling these new openings was not easy. Until and through the Fifties, Indian school staffs, although paid from federal funds, were in effect appointed by the religious organizations operating the schools. Many of the staff members were professionally quite unqualified , as no teacher's certificate was required of an Indian school teacher. The school principals and senior instructors were normally Roman Catholic priests or nuns, or Protestant clergymen, persons whose first duty and loyalty were, not to Indian Affairs, but to their churches. Thus they were seldom available for quasi-civil service appointments as school superintendents, especially...