Saskatchewan Polytechnic will observe September 30 as an official holiday, annually beginning this year. There will be no classes held on this date. Sask Polytech will offer all faculty, staff and students a day off to recognize the significance of the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.
The National Day for Truth and Reconciliation provides an opportunity to recognize and commemorate the legacy of residential schools. This date coincides with Orange Shirt Day, which began in 2013 and involves wearing orange shirts to honour Indigenous children forced to leave their families to attend residential schools. Sask Polytech will move our Orange Shirt Day events to September 29 to accommodate the holiday.
Let’s take this time to work together to create an inclusive, collaborative and respectful environment in which our community can grow, thrive, and in which we lift each other up. Sask Polytech acknowledges generations of Indigenous faculty, staff and learners as integral to our community, and we are committed to Indigenization. That commitment includes holistically integrating Indigenous ways of knowing, being, teaching and learning throughout all institutional practices, procedures and services.
The Cree phrase, miyo wahkohtowin, expresses the value and positivity of interconnectedness and relationships. Let us all honour this principle throughout every interaction, institutional practice, procedure, policy and service provided to our campus communities.
Establishing a national holiday to commemorate the tragic legacy of residential schools in Canada was one of the 94 recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
We hope our campus communities can use this time to come together in the spirit of reconciliation to remember and honour the First Nations, Métis and Inuit children who survived the residential school system, and those who were lost.
More information on the TRC is available by visiting: www.trc.ca.
Published Aug 2021