 So my name is Ricky Wiley. My traditional name is Sitka Willemat and I work at Tillicum Leilum as participant on the management team. So I oversee some of the programs and contracts with the early years and children and youth. So Tillicum Leilum is a multi-service organization. We have been in operation for over 50 years and started as a small gathering place for urban Indigenous people to come together after being able to leave the reserve and it's kind of grown from there with services. So we have a health center with lots of health programs. We have family programs, education programs, leadership and training. So we have a lot of different things going on at multiple times. So at Tillicum the programs oversee a lot of different ages. We have some zero to six programs. So we have things like our Building Better Babies which takes place even prenatally and then we have other parenting programs attached to that to six months. We have two daycares, one being our Aboriginal Head Start Program. So that's a preschool for children. We also have our Island Treasure Box which covers some of the little people and then going into school. We have some in-school support after-school program, girls groups, other kids groups going on during the year, summer camps. With our youth we have youth leadership, our youth hub, different groups counseling and then with our adults lots of family services, health services, men's groups, women's groups, substance abuse counseling, different types of counseling and then our learning center. So there's lots of different things going on and we try and capture all of our age groups including our elders just providing a lunch every every other week for them in the community as well. So the mission of Tillicum Laelum is just to enhance the lives of Indigenous people and help support that. So our programs try and reflect that. It's what are the gaps and what are the issues that are happening in the community and how can we support them. So our programs vary. We have education, we have health, we have family services, we have we have other other learning areas. We have cultural opportunities, we have elders groups, we have lots of different things happening. So the aim really kind of molds around what we have access to providing through our contracts and things like that, but also to what other community needs. So looking for that feedback from the community and having those talks of what is the need and how do we support people and there's so many different people and so many different needs. So trying to touch on as many things as we can. At Tillicum, like I said, we have so many different programs and the activities vary between what the programs are. So for instance our Aboriginal Head Start program, those children participate in cultural activities every day and then are also focusing on the literacy and numeracy, physical literacy portion of that and getting them school ready and then obviously having fun and interacting with each other. Another example would be our men's wellness group. So they meet weekly, but I think it's once a month they go and do a traditional bath up in the mountains. So that would be an activity that they have in their program. Afterschool programs are pretty rec based so they're working on relationship building with the kids there and playing lots of different games and doing things like that. However our leadership and training program, you might be resume building, seeking help for job supplies like work boots, things like that, but you also might be looking into like a Blade Runner's program and doing barista training, carpentry training, cooking training. There's different things that happen throughout the year so looking at what that might look like. So programs do have different activities depending on what they are. Our All My Relations group meets weekly, bi-weekly we have an elder that comes in and shares teachings with us and then on the other weeks we have things like our sweat and medicine walks and different things that are offered to the community. So activities are also based on community feedback and what's being what's the desire and the need of the community and changes all of the time. Program succession is based on a few different things. We need to do some evaluation where we are required to do some evaluation through our funding and I think it is very important to make sure you're evaluating your programs with the success is looking at do people seem like they're engaged in the program are people coming back to the program are they happy at the program when we ask them for feedback is it is a positive feedback or is it constantly that there's there's issues happening so I think attendance retention of people accessing other services within the organization having that trust with the people on that program to offer other things is are all measures of success for the programs. Each program at Tillicum is is kind of different I mean we try and get them to connect so that we can we can have a wraparound service approach but in doing in looking at the success of them or how we measure that is is sometimes something that points that we have to hit because of our contract so it's like did you see this many people are this many people continuing to come did these many children get get returned back home some of those things are very tangible and some of them are not some of them are based on the feeling of people and what if they feel it's contributing to their life and moving forward so like a rediscovering spirit program that is a very personal program and people take different things out of it from one to another so those measures of success and and hitting targets are sometimes tangible this many people graduated this many people moved on to v i u this many children are feeling safe in their home things like that from stats and self-reported and some of it some of it is just does just it comes much later and we hear those stories from people we have many people who started off in programs here as little people and now are working at this agency and wanting to give back to the community because of what this community has given to them so in looking at the differences between participants at the beginning of a program to the end it is very program dependent so if we look at our kett college program for instance that program is a four-week program prepping children for kindergarten before they attend we have children that sometimes have never left their their families and so it's a hard transition for them but in looking at the changes between one of them an example might be we've had we had one child that came into the program and it was a really hard transition process for them and by the end they were happy to go they felt they were encouraged at school they felt fine to leave on their own and didn't need their parents support in doing that anymore and were able to transition into kindergarten effectively so that might be one one area of how we see the changes we have people that go through programs where they start working with on life skills of intensive family support and they go from not being able to have their children in their care to having their children full-time and not needing ministry involvement so it looks really different from program to program in what skill building means and transformation means I would say program demands are quite high um in across the board so again going back to kett college that program started with 20 students and is now up to two classrooms so up to 40 and we could probably take more we did have a wait list our adult learning center same thing with a lot of our groups we are at capacity of what we can do with the staffing that we have so I would say that our enrollment is quite high continues to be quite high we're constantly looking at how we can enhance our services to deal with the demand for the need from people I think our positive feedback comes in many forms when we're doing evaluation of our program some of it is doing surveys and asking for quotes you know there's people who feel that without the support the extra supports of the program that they wouldn't otherwise be able to attend the program um looking at overcoming barriers like transportation and and um access to service is something that we hear constantly from participants also viewing the transformation in people of just their their way of being I think is is something that we see in that in that area but we the reports sometimes don't come until later it's we hear them from other areas in the community where they're working with an individual and they're like oh yeah we heard of you because so-and-so talked about this program and how it's how it's important and individual staff get get messages back from people thanking them for the impact that they've had on on their life and helping them move forward so sometimes they are in surveys people giving good feedback and comments but sometimes they don't come until later and people are personally expressing their gratitude for for what's been provided for them as a service I think with challenges in the pro in programs there will always be challenges with barriers and access to service with the capacity of programs and services and how they can service but overcoming that I think will constantly will constantly be a part of the work and I think working together with the the higher level of trying to access funding and and putting that forward and then with the staff and then with the community working together on understanding what the needs are and how we overcome those barriers is a huge part of it funding is also is always is always a huge challenge and we will be I think trying to overcome that for for ongoing in the future I think that's that's going to be a challenge for a while and and that's okay but overcoming those obstacles and and working with everybody on that is is important for us to keep educated and and fresh on what the needs are and how to be creative and how to put things things forward in a context that makes sense on a government level that can actually trickle down and make a difference on a community level I guess one thing just to just to kind of put forward about telecom is we have many people that have gone have spent their life their life at telecom myself I grew up at the Friendship Center my my mother's family is from Stimulus First Nation and they've never lived on the on the reserve but as a child was able to do programs here went through children's programs youth programs started volunteering became a summer camp leader and then have kind of worked through the process and I'm so happy to be here working with with the staff that we have here in the community it is like a home and it is like a family so I know that I'm not unique in that story there are there are people that I have worked with or work with now as co-workers that I was there summer camp leader when they were little kids or I have co-workers that was my summer camp leader when I was a little kid so I think that follow-through really being a part of the community is is huge and it's kind of seen at all all levels of life and I it needs to be like that education piece and the relationship building piece needs to be focused on throughout the whole thing we can't just decide to start doing it once you're in university or decide to start getting on with it it's never too late but I think laying the groundwork as as little people and being able to belong is is definitely important indigenous education is sort of a I guess a hard topic for me to define of what that actually looks like so if we're looking at the education of indigenous people I think that's a that's a huge topic in itself when we look at who are indigenous people what does that mean we have people that are living urban from here and are not from this community and their beliefs are different are completely different and they different from territory to territory people to people but then also from neighbor to neighbor family practices and beliefs are completely different so in lumping together what does it mean for indigenous education it's a hard one because constantly I feel like there's that look for tangible things of what that actually is and so with looking into that education piece is it looking at the values and fundamental fundamentals of indigenous practice that seem to have some consistencies between all or is it the individual things so with indigenous education there's that part of education for indigenous people and having that supported and looking through the systemic challenges that indigenous people go through in access to education that's that's one thing to focus like I guess my focus when I'm looking at what indigenous education is is the education of indigenous people but then looking at what is indigenous education look like on a large scale so are is everybody being education educated about indigenous indigenous people and again that it's that's hard to break down because there is so many variations between people and what that looks like however with indigenous education I think there does need to be a lot more work and a lot more focus around what what we want that to look like or what that is because right now there is I think there's a misconception and a lot of people are misinformed about about indigenous people and what that and what that is or what that means I think skill training for indigenous peoples is important I mean skill training for everybody is important but if we're focusing on the indigenous population for the sake of our conversation indigenous indigenous skill building is important at all levels I think skill building is always important at all levels the things that we learn as little people transpires to what we do as adults so putting that skill building in early and often is important there can be interventions taken later in life if you haven't gotten those those skills but looking at we can't just create a program or a model when you turn this age you can learn the skills to do XYZ it's how have people been prepared for that to go into that skill building program so if you haven't gotten those skills is there something to be able to get people to that level to look into skill building so for our leadership and training our employment program you know you have people that are trying to apply for jobs and look to get into that well if they don't have the skills to be able to do that job or if they don't even have the identification to be able to apply for a job say their sin number how where do we meet people where they're at to support them to to moving forward because not everybody is at the same place and we can't just run a program that is going to work for everybody that's not that's not the way it works everybody's not the same and everybody's at a different place so so I think that the leadership and training is super important but we do need to be flexible and where we're meeting people and how we're going through that process in the next 10 years for indigenous education I would like to see I would like to see many things happen I would like to see indigenous people feeling comfortable going through the I guess traditional education system and feeling supported and being able to do that mental academic part of part of education but I would also like to see education take a little bit of a change on their view of what it means to be educated and take a more holistic approach I think there's so many things that are happening in today's world and you can see some of the breakdown happen where we're forgetting some of those other parts of ourself and having that education and I think including indigenous ways of knowing and and that education piece of how how people need to focus on their whole selves is a part of that change systemically but with indigenous education I think I would I would love to see it in more more of our programs and really looking at looking at a more focus and more care taken on what that actually means so does indigenous education mean mean oh we have more indigenous people graduating what does that mean are they still feeling like they're supported in that area are people being educated in the area of indigenous people the history the present and the future how do we how do we move forward with everybody here in feeling that they're supported indigenous and not but how do we how do we work together on that and how do we form education and programs that people can feel safe to attend and that they're not they're not swaying one way or another but they're both being respected and being able to move forward so I think the the area of indigenous education for the future is something that still needs to be focused on heavily and I think it will come from the the children the students the faculty and and our our elders and looking at what that actually looks like for for education and what do people need to gain that knowledge we have this system of education where you graduate high school you go on to your bachelor's degree then you go on to a master's degree you go on to a phd and we have people teaching those courses of being experts in indigenous studies or aboriginal studies or first nation studies that could be that they have taken they've done two major projects and taken a few undergrad courses on that area and I'm not saying that that's a bad thing but looking at how how broad of a scale just what what is covered under indigenous and we stick we can unfortunately we're sticking it into one course where people feel that they're educated in that area and they have a handle on it and that's something that needs to be looked at much more