‘It’s not just an Indigenous issue’
Orange Shirt Day is about education and awareness of residential schools’ effects
Chloe Goodison wants to tell you all about her new orange T-shirt.
The Grade 11 student has been working hard with friend Nathan Piasecki and a leadership teacher to bring Orange Shirt Day — a day where people wear orange shirts to honour the survivors of residential schools, their families and their loved ones who didn’t survive — to Heritage Woods Secondary School in Port Moody for the first time on Friday.
Goodison, 16, said she has no Indigenous heritage, but came to understand the importance of learning about Indigenous history when she read Ojibway author Richard Wagamese’s novel Indian Horse. It tells the story of a boy who survived the residential school system and became a star hockey player.
“I had never learned or been taught about residential schools before then,” Goodison said.
She began to read more about the schools and her parents took her to see speakers who shared their stories of survival. When she heard about Orange Shirt Day from a Burnaby teacher, she knew she wanted to bring it to her own school.
Phyllis Webstad, a Northern Secwepemc woman from the Stswecem’c Xgat’tem First Nation, created the Sept. 30 event in 2013 and said she was impressed by Goodison’s work to help expand it.
Last week, Webstad, Goodison and Piasecki met at a school in Langley where Webstad was giving a talk on residential schools and her new book, The Orange Shirt Story, which describes her residential school experience when she was six and had her orange shirt taken from her. Webstad said her year at St. Joseph’s Mission, near Williams Lake, was a difficult time for her, but not like the suffering of those who spent years in the system such as her grandmother, who turns 100 on Friday.
“Our world is changing and First Nations are gaining strength, gaining a voice, and our history is being mandated to be taught in the schools,” she said.
“What happened was not just our history — it’s Canadian history — so all Canadians need to learn about this.”
Webstad said she sees comments on Facebook from people saying Indigenous people need to move on from the past. She said it’s important to remember that the last residential school closed only 22 years ago.
“There’s a gap in their understanding of history, so what I’m doing is really important to fill in those gaps,” she said.
“People usually don’t understand that we were taken away from our homes and families. With my grandmother, she was not allowed to speak her language, not allowed to go home, beaten, sexually abused.
“Yes, it is the past and we are looking to the future, however, there is a thing called intergenerational trauma. There are still survivors that are alive who have never dealt with their experience.”
Goodison has been selling Orange Shirt Day shirts at her school at lunch for $15, with all proceeds going to the Orange Shirt Society in support of reconciliation programs.
She believes the event will be well-received by her schoolmates and teachers, and hopes they will take time that day to talk about residential schools.
“I think it’s totally a part of Canadian history and I think it’s an error on the Canadian government’s part. It’s something that every Canadian has to work toward spreading awareness of and toward reconciliation,” she said. “It’s not just an Indigenous issue at all.”
What happened was not just our history — it’s Canadian history — so all Canadians need to learn about this.