Hot lunch program one of many services to community

Achievement Page 13

Theresa Stevenson, this year's recipient of the National Aboriginal Achievement Award for Community Development, is best known for the hot lunch program called "Chili for Children," which she established in 1979 in a low-income neighborhood in Regina for Aboriginal school children. That program is still going strong and has expanded to three locations with new people at the helm.

What is not as well known outside Saskatchewan are the many contributions Stevenson has made on numerous boards and projects to improve Native peoples' access to housing and education. She has been involved in every aspect of community life from libraries to literacy programs to lobbying government on behalf of her people.

Her current memberships illustrate her devotion to humanitarian causes and her commitment to her own people's betterment. The 71-year-old member of Cowesses First Nation near Broadview, Sask. is retired now, but is still involved with 10 committees and boards. Principally, she is the executive director of Regina Indian Community Awareness, Inc.

She also works with the public library system, her local community centre and a high school parent council, and is on the board of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations Silver Sage Housing. Other involvements include the Touchwood File Hills Tribal Council Pathways Project; Regina Treaty Status Indians Services Inc.; and Wichihik Iskwewak Safe House. The fact she never got beyond a Grade 10 education has never stopped her seeking out challenges and getting the job done.

Her motivation to fight poverty and take a leadership role stemmed from the example of her grandfather, a former chief of the Cowesses Indians, who worked hard on behalf of his people. That and her own experiences with deprivation and hunger, which drove her and her husband Robert to leave their three children with relatives in 1955 and head to Wolf Point, Montana, where Robert could get work. The Stevensons lived in Montana 16 years.

Her work on housing issues began 21 years ago. Appointed executive director of the newly formed Regina Indian Community Awareness, Inc. (RICA), Stevenson began by assisting Native people moving into the urban environment in hope of a more prosperous life. Often they could not afford the lodging that was available. Her group forged links with the province to provide low-income houses, initially through Saskatchewan Housing.

Eventually the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations was formed and control of Native housing was turned over to the bands. The project grew beyond a few wartime houses to nearly 400 now. Silver Sage Housing employs about 15 people and has recently hired an Aboriginal general manager. Stevenson is on the housing selection committee, which gives first priority to Elders and second priority to Native students.

Another project Stevenson took to heart more than 15 years ago was tackling the board of education about the demoralizing lack of success of Native students in the public school system. Indian children were not graduating; there were no Indian teachers; and there certainly were no Indian role models in the schools.

Stevenson's group, consisting of a United Church minister, two University of Regina professors, a public school teacher and herself, presented a brief to the school board requesting role models.

Now there are role models in place. Native teachers are being hired out of the Indian Federated College and more Native people are employed by schools generally, but Stevenson thinks there is still room for improvement. She sees her greatest contribution as having brought the issues regarding Indian education to the attention of the school board, which was very resistant to change at the start.

Stevenson's story is incomplete if the hot lunch program, "Chili for Children," is not explained. She got the idea from the people at Wolf Point.

"I really admire them," she says of the Indian people stateside. "One thing, the student there don't like to be called dropouts." Kids can't learn when they're hungry, and in Montana they addressed that problem at school. She adds she saw there were a lot more graduates coming out of the Montana reservation than at home.

So Stevenson and RICA began a similar initiative in Regina, after a school principal told her that many Indian children came to school hungry. Stevenson says her middle son, Wes, now the vice president of the Indian Federated College, helped her get started, and so did some local churches, which provided funds. Twenty little boys came for the first lunch of soup and sandwiches.

The school board was persuaded to contribute $1,200, and the numbers of children coming for lunch jumped to 50, then 100. High schools and the local police pitched in to help defray expenses, but it was hardly enough.

"I prayed that if God wanted the lunches to continue, he would help us," Stevenson relates. She adds that she was prepared to accept that they might lose the program for lack of money.

Soon after, a Native reporter from the CBC got interested and arranged to get Stevenson's hot lunch program promoted in the media, when it looked like it would end after a year. Stevenson and her group had noticed that chili was the most popular lunch they served, so when asked on television what the program needed most, she said "Beans." The resultant publicity netted them enough money to provide nutritious lunches for three years and to buy a second-hand van to transport the food.

"It was an answer to prayer," Stevenson says. "If you have a vision and you are being guided from above, nothing will stand in your way," Stevenson concludes. She attributes all her successes in life to following this basic creed.