On Friday, October 1, our class focused on the Aboriginal Communities and counselling First Nations children/youth. We learned about First Nation children and youth growing up in with complex social and family issues because of their surroundings when growing up.
Andy Leggett came to our class to share his experience of working with children, youth and their families in the Aboriginal Community. Andy is the Clinical Director of Broken Arrow Residential Treatment Services (BARTS) in Cobourg. I was excited to have Andy to come to our class and share his story with us because last year in my Child Abuse, Neglect and Family Violence course we had Alicia McMurray from Broken Arrow speak about Physical Abuse, Sexual Abuse and Neglect Treatment and her presentation was very interesting and touching. After, Alicia’s presentation I became more interested in learning more about the Aboriginal Culture and working with children and youth.
I realized that First Nations people grow up and are raised in secluded areas and experiences complex situations and don’t receive the proper help and care they deserve. Personally, I grew up thinking that First Nations people chose to all live together in one area because of their beliefs. As a I got older I learned that this was not always the case and that many First Nations people lived in one area because of the way other people treated them and have disrespected the way they live. I have realized that some people believe that Aboriginal people don’t deserve our help because they have chosen to live the way they do. I don’t think this is right because I feel that every individual, whether they are a child, youth or adult deserve the proper help that they need and no one should take that from them. I don’t think that it is fair to treat them that way because then we are sending them the message that we don’t care about them. I struggle with trying to understand how people can judge and stigmatize First Nations people without even knowing what they experience in their life.
Currently, I work at a Residential Treatment Facility for children and youth and this summer we had a youth that wanted to learn about her Aboriginal background. The staff were on board with helping this young woman learn about her culture, as a staff working with her I was very involved with this process. During the summer I had the pressure of accompanying this youth and another worker to a local First Nations community in our area, to a few pow wow’s and to the Museum of Civilization in Ottawa. Experiencing a pow wow was a very exciting for me because I had never been to an event like that before. Seeing all the person representing their different tribes, dancing, singing and interacting with one another was amazing and a good learning experience. Both myself and the other staff member where very engaged in the pow wow participating in the event with our client. At the end of the day one of women from one of the tribes provided our youth with her own cloak that she wore to the pow wow. Occasionally, this youth will dance around the house in her cloak with a huge smile on her face and talk about that day. I am very glad I got to experience this event with my client because not only was it a learning experience for my client but for myself as well.
Overall, I am very interested in the work that Broken Arrow does with individuals of the First Nations and would like to continue learning about their agency and their services. I am hoping to attend the training that Broken Arrow is providing to their Foster Parents on Orillia this upcoming month that Andy invited our class too.
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