Don't speak Ojibway? You can still get a job teaching it in an Ontario school:
takingbackourculture:
gwiingwa:
allthecanadianpolitics:
sbstewartlaing:
sugarmoonaki:
allthecanadianpolitics:
David Thompson believed his Ojibway heritage and his university degree with special qualifications in native language instruction would give him job security as an Ojibway teacher in Ontario’s public school system.
He was wrong.
During a round of job cuts this year, Thompson was bumped out of his full-time permanent job teaching high school Ojibway with Lakehead Public Schools in Thunder Bay, Ont., by a man who is a specialist in business studies and has no professional qualifications in any language.
The teacher currently doing the job is not Indigenous and does not speak Ojibway, Thompson wrote in a complaint filed with the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario.
“It’s a total insult to our youth to put someone in front of the classroom to teach Ojibway, who is not Ojibway, who is not affiliated with the culture or brought up with it,” said Thompson, who was raised by his grandparents at Rocky Bay First Nation in northwestern Ontario.
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what the FUCK
Is there a way to contact the school district and register our collective displeasure? Because there is no way a highly qualified Native teacher should get bumped from teaching his own language by a completely unqualified white dude.
Lakehead Public Schools contact information:
Jim McCuaig Education Centre
2135 Sills Street
Thunder Bay, Ontario
P7E 5T2
Phone: (807) 625-5100
Toll Free: 1-888-565-1406
Twitter: @LakeheadSchools
Facebook: “Lakehead Public Schools”
More contact information here as well.
This is common practice - of both the public and catholic boards - in the city. This isn’t the first time I’ve heard about incidents like this. Such bullshit.
Nah. That’s completely messed up. I have to go through hoops to be able to teach my language. A non-native shouldn’t be allowed in those spaces.