Dumont CD available

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"Give us the ability to act to other people without bias, prejudice, accepting them at face value and having them accept us the same way, never in a confrontational way, but always in the spirit of serenity and peace. . . Let's accept people for what they are, remembering where we came from, where we're going, and how we're going to get there."

This portion of the opening prayer given by Claude Adams, a highly respected Metis Elder in Prince Albert, summed up much of the sentiment behind the creation of the educational CD ROM entitled: The Metis: Our People, Our Story. The CD ROM was created by two well-known educators in the province of Saskatchewan.

"This is 20 years of Gabriel Dumont Institute's best stuff. It's all on one disk," said Calvin Racette, executive director of the Gabriel Dumont Institute. "I certainly want to recognize our partner Arnold Publishing in this. They've been excellent to work with. They've been very good to us. They've been very professional, and we're very pleased to have worked with them."

The initial market for the CD is within the province and it is the hopes of GDI that it makes the recommended resources list with Saskatchewan Education.

"We try to develop our stuff that meets the standards for Saskatchewan Education so that it becomes on the recommended textbooks list so it becomes approved curriculum material," Racette said. "Through that process, with those things as part of our guiding principles, we work to meet their standards and then we become part of their resource base. Their whole objective is resource based learning, and we're really involved with the resource end of it, so we're seen as sort of a silent partner."

Armand Martin, the director of Saskatchewan Education, has seen other educational materials designed with Aboriginal education in mind. He was impressed with the CD.

"This would be the first that I have seen that has been this extensive," said Martin. "We certainly do have some resources that have been produced that are in print, but I'm unaware of anything at this point that is this extensive. So we certainly look forward to taking a look at it. It's really exciting. I really like the interactive. These are the types of resources that I like to make available to both teachers and students. These types of resources are the types that kids really eat up. We work a lot with them in terms of understanding what is needed. We are involved with helping them to evaluate what is out there."

The CD is being looked at to be used in both the general social studies and Native studies curriculums, at various grade levels. The fact that it would be used not exclusively in the Native studies classes would prove to be a benefit to the future generations of society, according to Keith Goulet, the minister of Northern Affairs.

"I thought that the CD was absolutely exciting," said Goulet. "I thought that it was very, very strategically important in the history of education for this province. I thought that the voices of the Metis people are going to be heard, not only by our children, but by future leaders. I thought that this was important in regards to the opening prayer by the Elder, in regards to the importance of building on respect, equality, and the fight against racism.

"I thought it was very important not only in regards to the depiction of Metis people in history, but that Metis people are also the makers of history and the writers of history."

How much information can one little CD ROM hold, anyway?

"There's about a thousand print pages," said Racette. "There's about 1,200 archival and contemporary images. It sort of shows the social life, family life, political life . . . all aspects of Metis history. I suppose it covers 500 years of history on one disk."

Who was it that actually did the research for all of the content included on the CD? One of the members of the research team was Todd Paquin, an archaeologist and anthropologist.

"I was originally hired on as a reseacher with it," Paquin said. "Leah (Dorion), Michelle (Isbister), myself and Patrick (Young), we sort of brainstormed the concept and how we envisioned the outline of the CD ROM. We started off with the basic research, and were hired on for several contracts after that."

As is the case with any project of this size - which saw the research team travel to different parts of Canada to gather their information - it leaves an impression on a person.

"Through time, I was hired on by Gabriel Dumont Institute as a curriculum developer in addition to working on the CD ROM," said Paquin. "We did a lot of work travelling to communities, dealing with community people and doing interviews with Elders, which was a fantastic experience. It started off, in the beginning, as an academic experience, but after, it became very much a cultural thing."

Cultural identity for Metis people has been something that has not truly been addressed in a majority of educational situations, but according to Racette, this CD should help to change all that.

"It has huge potential in helping our kids to know who they are, where they came from, (and) help break down those images they've dealt with over the years. It has a very good outlining our history and our struggle as a people."

The CD is available through GDI Saskatoon, and costs $69.00 plus GST.