Teacher graduates celebrate successes in Ottawa

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On May 30, graduating students from Matawa First Nation's community based Native Teacher Education Program (NTEP) headed to Ottawa to celebrate the culmination of two years' hard work.

Gloria Hendrick-Laliberte, NTEP co-ordinator for Matawa First Nations Management in Thunder Bay, accompanied the group to their graduation ceremony.

She said she accompanied a group of students, from the Matawa communities of Aroland (Angela and Theresa Towedo, daughter and mother), Eabametoong (Victoria Oshag), Ginoogaming (Johanne Ferris), Neskantaga (Liz Moonias and Geraldine Yellowhead), Webequie (Cecilia Jacob, Mary Jane Jacob, Wilma Spence and Grace Whitehead) and Long Lac #58 (Beedahbin "Dawn" Buswa, Judy Desmoulin, Teri Fortier, Claire O'Nabigon).

"After two years of classes, practice teaching, working full-time, family commitments and travelling to Thunder Bay for summer classes, the perseverance, dedication, and frustration finally paid off," she said. "Upon arrival, we caught the city bus to the University of Ottawa campus station and walked until we found the residence. The grads went to see Dr. Cheryll Duquette (associate professor in the faculty of education) for an orientation and to fill out the necessary forms. The weekend was spent exploring the city-going to museums, shopping at the Rideau Centre, and walking."

The grads also toured Parliament Hill, took a computer course, attended a barbecue and met staff at the Faculty of Education.

Their ceremony was held June 4 at the National Arts Centre. J. Robert Pritchard, president and chief executive officer of Torstar Corporation was on hand to commend the students and wish them well in their careers.

Getting there required a lot of work and academic preparation. Hendrick-Laliberte said entry into the course requires Grade 12 or some post-secondary equivalent, along with some experience working in an education-related field in a school.

"The students who take the program are usually classroom assistants, teacher aides, tutor escorts."

She said they have to do 500 hours of work in the school, in both years of the program, either paid or volunteer. That takes about five months and 12 weeks of practicum each year. The practicum is broken down, approximately, into three weeks of observation and three weeks of practice-teaching in the first year. In the second year, students teach and develop lesson plans for six weeks.

"In order to pass, they have to pass all their placements, their practicum," Hendrick-Laliberte said.

Both summers of the program, students go to Thunder Bay for four weeks, and complete eight courses in all.

Then they take courses throughout the academic year, through Contact North, one day a week. The other four weekdays, they work in their school.

In the fall of the first year, they take a seminar on reflective teaching, and over the first fall and winter, they take one class. In the winter, they do their practical field experience.

The second year, they take two courses between September and May.

Hendrick-Laliberte said the program is intended to train graduates who will work in their own communities, for the most part, thus overcoming the problem of teacher turnover common to northern fly-in reserves.

Graduates are qualified to teach on any reserve "up to Grade 6. They have their primary-junior certification, and they're recommended to the Ontario College of Teachers, and they get their Native Teacher Education certificate."

Hendrick-Laliberte said that although they could, in theory, teach off-reserve, "they would be at the bottom of the pay scale," because "it's not a degree program."

Off-reserve teachers currently have 10 years to complete their degree. "They transfer their credits to the University of Ottawa, and the University of Ottawa grants them their B.Ed., once they get their B.A."

Claire O'Nabigon, 41, said approximately 90 per cent of the graduates were mature students. On June 24, she said for some of them, NTEP "opened our yes as to what we should be doing ... it just made us realize that we want more now, in terms of education.

"I've chosen to go back to school full-time."

In September, O'Nabigon is going to attend Lakehead University in Thunder Bay to pursue a bachelor of arts degree. That's a three-hour drive from home, so she'll live there during the academic term.

She's not sure she will become a teacher, but "with the education I will be receiving, I definitely will have a lot more to offer to our community."

She said two reserves in Long Lac (Ginoogaming and Long Lac #58) with a combined population of about 1,000 people, formed an education authority five years ago, which O'Nabigon said may give her an opportunity to work in curriculum development in three years' time when she gets her degree.

She said she took NTEP "just to better understand the curriculum," having already had considerable experience as an administrator and a counsellor within the educational system.

O'Nabigon said she is very happy with her training through NTEP and she is very motivated to keep on learning.