The First Nations College of Canada (FNUniv) is receiving greater than $2 million for brand spanking new out of doors training centre that it’s calling its fourth campus.
The funding is being offered by each the provincial and federal governments. It’s a part of greater than $19.7 million in joint funding for 25 infrastructure tasks throughout the province.
FNUniv’s out of doors training location, which is already in use for college kids, is 22 acres. It is positioned alongside the South Saskatchewan River close to the city of St. Louis, simply 30 kilometres south of Prince Albert.
The out of doors centre will function a spot for Indigenous educating and studying on the land. It’s going to embody in a single day services comparable to cabins, bathe and washroom services, an upgraded mess corridor with a kitchen, water and wastewater infrastructure.
“There’s actually not an entire lot there, and our college students and elders and college members have been partaking in land-based and cultural educating and studying on the property for the previous few years. And so we simply want the essential necessities,” mentioned Jacqueline Ottmann, president of FNUniv.
“[We need] small lodging for our elders simply to make sure that they’re wholesome and protected, and that we’re including to their consolation.”
The campus may also ultimately embody a everlasting sweat lodge, however Ottmann mentioned that might take a while.
Demonstrations of reconciliation
FNUniv has been on the land close to St. Louis for about three years, in accordance with Ottmann.
FNUniv’s training and social work packages provide land and place-based studying and cultural teachings on the campus. College students usually spend two weeks on-location.
“Earlier than that the college did not personal property for land and place-based studying. So now now we have this property and it is lovely.”
Ottmann mentioned a scholar that attended the cultural camp final summer season informed her he hoped that each one FNUniv college students would get that have.
“Primarily he mentioned that he walked away from from the cultural camp in superb spirits. He simply felt holistically nicely.”
Ottmann hopes many college students share the identical emotions sooner or later.
The brand new funding announcement comes on the heels of the FNUniv securing a land switch from town of Prince Albert for a brand new northern campus construct.
“These are demonstrations of reconciliation and, much more particularly, financial reconciliation and training sovereignty,” mentioned Ottmann.
“These are all necessary to Indigenous peoples and really useful to society as an entire.”
Different tasks which have acquired infrastructure funding from the Authorities of Saskatchewan and the federal authorities embody Estevan’s leisure centre, the West Central Occasion Centre in Kindersley and a number of other rural municipalities throughout the province.
“The investments introduced right this moment will create alternatives for Saskatchewanians to construct a greater future for themselves, their households and their communities,” mentioned Dominic LeBlanc, minister of intergovernmental affairs, infrastructure and communities, in a information launch on Wednesday.
“We’ll proceed working with our companions to assist rural and Indigenous communities throughout Saskatchewan.”
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