Lekwungen

And, um, I have two children.

I married into the Songhees Nation people, and my children are Songhees members, so, so that's my little family here, so.

I go home once in a while, but not, not like I should.

But it's just the way it is and I had to go through my healing process before I even could, you know, do that.

I'm very grateful to him.

I mean, it's different world today, and I'm very happy now after all my healing work I've gone through.

And I appreciate the Songhees people, the Esquimalt Nation people for taking care of me.

They really took care of me and our culture, and I'm very grateful to them people.

And my experience was, uh, both in the province of British Columbia, I think a majority of, uh, school boards use this kind of system, and, and as well it's used throughout the rest of the country.

What about this move, though, to have elected positions directly for Songhees and Esquimalt Nations? Is that new a- as far as you're aware?

That is new.

That is new, and that's a great development.

Um, y- you know, uh, the graduation rates for, uh, uh, our Indigenous kids has been, uh, not as good as it should be.

It's continuing to improve.

Uh, I think, uh, one of the really good ways to ensure it improves more is to get all of our communities involved in the system, and I think this, what this does is ensure that, uh, uh, we have very unique c- communities in both Esquimalt and Songhees, that they will be integrally and directly involved in the school district at a, at a, uh, uh, uh, I guess an overall management level.

You can put it that way.

The most brutal part of winter seems to be over and we're looking forward to a beautiful spring.

Today we're recording at the University of Victoria, which is located on the traditional territory of the Lekwungen, Songhees, and Kosapsen peoples.

I want to extend our gratitude for being here as uninvited guests and respect the ongoing historical relationships of the Lekwungen and the Wasanich people with this land.

We're so fortunate to record this podcast and to do this work here on this land.

I'm so grateful.

We'll politely agree to disagree on that.

But in conversations that happened subsequent to that, there was a member of what was called the Victoria City Family, which was an Indigenous advisory body composed of both members from the Lekwungen-speaking peoples as well as elsewhere.

There was a member of that body.

Her name was Janice Simcoe.