[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Tuesday, October 17, 1995
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[English]
The Chairman: Good morning, everybody. I'd like to welcome you to our subcommittee.
Before you start your presentation, I would like to ask that you all introduce yourselves for the records.
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Mr. Arnold Fox (Chairman, Board of Governors, Red Crow Community College): I'm Arnold Fox. I'm from the Blood Tribe or, more specifically, the Red Crow Community College board of governors and the Kainai board of education. I'm chairman of those groups.
Also here are Marie Smallface-Marule, who is the president of the Red Crow Community College and who will be speaking to the subcommittee; and Narcisse Blood, who is the representative on the board of governors from the Blood Tribe chief and council.
I would like to ask Narcisse to start us off this morning.
Mr. Narcisse Blood (Governor, Red Crow Community College): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like first of all to acknowledge the member of the Bloc Québécois. He visited the Blood Tribe reserve and it was really nice that he showed such an interest by coming out there. I certainly remember that nice trip and meeting you and discussing some things. I think that goes a long way towards mutual respect and understanding.
I just wanted to briefly say that I appeared before this committee in 1989 with our elder, Mrs. Margaret Hindman, and my spouse, Alvine Mountain Horse, back in 1989, on the very same issue we're currently faced with. A number of our elders were quite concerned about the student hunger strike taking place around that time.
The hunger strike was in protest of the cutbacks and the capping of post-secondary education. Trying to make some headway on this issue was quite an ordeal for both the students and the delegation from the Blood Tribe. We're here because this issue is obviously still of concern to us. It has not been resolved.
I just wanted to briefly make those comments, and I will get into those aspects of this particular concern of our elders with regard to our treaty rights.
Our president of Red Crow Community College, Marie Marule, will be giving our presentation.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Ms Marie Smallface-Marule (President, Red Crow Community College): Good morning, Mr. Chairman, honourable gentlemen. We appreciate the opportunity to present our concerns on the issues of adult and post-secondary education.
We have been in Ottawa each of the last two years seeking an audience with the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs. When the Sub-Committee on Aboriginal Education was established, we hoped we would have an invitation to address this subcommittee. We were, however, becoming very concerned because we had been advised that your hearings had been concluded. We were therefore quite pleasantly surprised when we received the invitation to make this presentation.
We have prepared a booklet for you that summarizes our concerns, and we've provided some supporting documentation. I also have some other documents on this subject that we will leave with you or your researchers.
Our concern is that your predecessors on the standing committee had made specific recommendations in 1989, but to the best of our knowledge, these recommendations were not acted upon. If anything, they were ignored when the post-secondary student support program was capped. Our concern, specifically for the Blood Tribe, arises with the capping of the post-secondary student support program.
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One of the most important recommendations of your predecessors in their report of June 1989 was the need for the federal government to establish an appropriate forum within which to resolve the issue of post-secondary education as a treaty right. This has not taken place. This issue has to be dealt with. It cannot continue unresolved and without proper attention.
The recommendations also specified that there be adequate resourcing of the post-secondary student support program and that there be established a process and mechanism for involvement of first nations persons in the development of appropriate policies, guidelines and terms of reference for the post-secondary student support program. This has not happened.
We believe the work of your predecessors was excellent and if it had been acted upon we wouldn't be here today. We don't want to grow cynical about the effectiveness of parliamentary systems and processes, so I appeal to you that your work receive the appropriate attention and follow-up so that we may continue to have faith in our parliamentary system.
I believe the intent of your predecessors in their report was to permit continued review of the department's actions on their recommendations, so I believe it is appropriate that a review be undertaken of adult and post-secondary education.
We are particularly concerned on the Blood reserve, because the capping of the program in October 1991 immediately put us in a deficit situation. Our commitments prior to the capping exceeded the arbitrarily, unilaterally established budget level for the Blood Tribe post-secondary student support program, so that by the time the program was capped we had already made commitments to students that exceeded the amount of money that was made available at that time. We had just taken over the administration and management of that program from the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. We took over in May 1990, and the capping took place less than a year and a half later.
When our chief and council agreed to assume responsibility for the administration and management of that program, they specified in their band council resolutions that they did so on the understanding that it would be adequately resourced and that it would not in any way undermine our treaty rights. Those were the conditions under which our chief and council assumed responsibility for the post-secondary student support program, and they delegated that responsibility to the Blood Tribe education board, which in turn delegated the management on a day-to-day basis to the Red Crow Community College.
The understanding the Blood Tribe education board had, which was specified in the motion they passed to assume responsibility for this program, also indicated they would do so only if it were adequately resourced. Both the chief and council and the Blood Tribe education board indicated that they would not be responsible for a program that would not meet the needs of their people. That's the situation in which we found ourselves less than a year and a half after the program was assumed by ourselves. We saw that as a breach of the trust that our chief and council believed to be a part of the agreement with INAC for assuming responsibility for the program.
We also saw it as a means of forcing our own people to deny treaty rights to members of their community because of inadequate resourcing of the program. So that became a very serious issue for us. Yet I believe that at Red Crow Community College the Blood Tribe post-secondary students support program administrators have demonstrated that they have been successful in management of the program.
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I have in the tables here demonstrated that our average cost for managing the program has been under 5% of the program budget. Despite the demand on the program, we have managed to limit the deficit of that program and to develop a means of deficit recovery. But it has meant that we have deferred a whole number of students. This year alone we had to defer over 100 students. These are new applicants, not returning students.
Our program has been successful. We have had less than a 5% dropout of students we have sponsored over the past five years. And to the detriment of our students, we have kept the average cost per student below $10,000.
This has resulted in discrimination. Where other tribes have received funds beyond their needs, they have been able to increase the rates of training allowance to their students. Some are receiving $200 to $300 more per month in training allowance than our students are. I believe that to be a serious discrimination against our students. We have not had the ability, because of the financial constraints, to increase rates to our students for over 10 years. This has really meant a severe financial problem for our students attending institutions, particularly those who have had access to institutions in the United States.
Access to post-graduate studies has been far more accessible in the United States for Blood Tribe members than in Canadian institutions. We have 75 continuing students this year in U.S. institutions and we have 29 students doing post-graduate work, masters or PhD programs. Most of these are in the United States. They're only receiving, if they're a single person, $1,000 Canadian. This is what they have to survive on, wherever they are in the United States. Given the exchange rate that applies to Canadian dollars today, it provides them with about $675 U.S. a month.
These are some of the problems we encounter because of the level of funding that has been provided to the Blood Tribe.
We believe that capping the program has not in fact reduced the costs of the program. In fact, in some programs we have under-utilization, though with a larger percentage of population we are utilizing the money for increasing the rates to the students or for providing additional administrative support services to their students. If it had not been capped it would have been at a lower level for those bands. Although ours might have been higher, it would have been averaged because of the differences between the usage and demand for the support by different tribes.
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In addition to that, those we have been unable to support have remained on social assistance, so it does not result in a saving in terms of government funds. We think that's an important point. The capping of the program ends up being negative. It forces people who are eligible to be in training programs to remain on social welfare. There is no saving to the government. I think that's a critical consideration.
We're also concerned with the terms of reference for that program and the fact that the Blood Tribe had taken applications from anyone seeking training, but found that about 25% to 30% of the applicants were ineligible under the existing guidelines. In other words, they wanted to enter programs at the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology or similar vocational and technical colleges that did not require grade 12 diplomas in the programs of study and/or where the programs were under eight months' duration.
For instance, the emergency medical technician training program at the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology has 600 hours of instructional time. But it's very comprehensive and intense over a four-month period. The requirement is a grade 11 education.
Those students do not fall within the guidelines, so we've been unable to sponsor such students. We found there were about 200 to 250 per year who we had to deny funding to because their programs of study did not fall under the guidelines provided for the program. These persons were not able to access funds elsewhere.
The occupational skills training funds available to the reserves are so insufficient as to be non-existent. We get $110,000 for the Blood reserve. That might sponsor ten students for a technical training program. We have a high demand for technical and vocational training. Those are usually in occupational areas where employment is quite readily available, so there's a difficulty there.
For adult education we had no provision for our students other than the grants we occasionally obtained from the previous Canada Employment and Immigration Commission, presently Human Resources Development. Those we had to do on a year to year basis with no guarantee of ongoing funding, so there was no guarantee if we brought an adult in to begin their grade 9 level education that we could take them through to grade 12.
In addition, there was no way we could make commitments to instructors for more than one year at a time because of those funding provisions. This meant we were training teachers all the time to teach within our communities and to teach adults in an appropriate fashion. When we obtained good instructors, we couldn't guarantee them long-term employment because there were no resources to continue those programs beyond the yearly basis on which they were funded. That was a serious concern of ours.
Right now we have arranged pre-vocational training funds through INAC. That is permitting us some stability in that program, but it is not available across the country. We believe there have to be special efforts made to resource - particularly on reserves - adult and post-secondary programs of study and courses, preferably through first nations institutions such as Red Crow Community College.
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We are also extremely concerned with the cutbacks instituted by the Ministry of Health and the Department of Human Resources Development for our on-reserve programs. We're hoping the present ongoing review may have positive results. We could certainly use your support in that area to ensure that there are positive results.
If we do not receive adequate resources for the Blood reserve in that program, Red Crow Community College stands to lose over $171,000, which we have been using to provide what we consider to be skills development among our people.
In the past four years we have offered the social work diploma program of Mount Royal College at Red Crow Community College. We've had three classes. This is the third one, which is in its second year of this diploma program. We saw a desperate need for trained social workers on the Blood Tribe, particularly because we're in the midst of negotiating -
The Chairman: Five more minutes.
Ms Smallface - Marule: - with the provincial and federal governments for a tripartite agreement for our management of the child welfare programs and services on our reserve. We identified a whole number of positions that would be available for social workers.
In addition, we've run two classes over the last three years in business and general administration. Again, we have a very ambitious social and economic development plan for the Blood reserve. We need persons who are trained in business and in general administration to make sure our private business initiatives are successful within the community.
Of those two programs, one was resourced directly to Mount Royal College, through the advanced education department of Alberta, through a program they called the adult development program. The social work program was being financed for delivery on the Blood reserve in that manner until this spring.
Then the federal government cut back on their cost-sharing of that program, and as a result, the Alberta advanced education department advised Mount Royal College that they would no longer fund that program. So in the middle of the two-year program they discontinued funding, and we had to finance that remaining year under our post-secondary student support program.
The Human Resources Development regional office was providing moneys to the advanced education department of Alberta on a cost-shared basis and they withdrew their funding. The result was the termination of funding of our program on the Blood reserve.
In addition to that, we were financing the business administration program through the grants to the Blood reserve. We were advised this past spring that the program was being severely restricted in funding and that money would not be available next year. I've detailed that in the appendices here for your information.
The other thing that concerns us with regard to the purported cutbacks in health and the discontinuation of treaty right provisions to Indians who are living off-reserve is that we're afraid of the impact on our students who are studying off the reserve.
We investigated last year and we found that 139 dependent children of our post-secondary students were of school age and attending schools off-reserve. They were severely impacted by the education cutbacks in Alberta, whereby in Calgary they were being required to pay about $400 per semester for kindergarten education. The school fees our post-secondary students ran into for their children attending schools off-reserve ranged from $100 to $200 per semester. These are not provisions in their training allowance.
If they have to provide for the medical care of their children while they're studying off-reserve, they will be unable to do so. There will be a lot of people who remain on the reserve because they cannot face the costs of off-reserve medical and educational services.
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That's the result of some of these decisions, and we have to appeal to you to not put a boundary on treaty rights. They are treaty rights negotiated for all of Canada and it shouldn't matter about the residency of the person who is entitled to them. This is in the context of the decade of world indigenous peoples and Canada's commitments to observing the rights and privileges of our people in Canada.
The Chairman: Thank you very much.
We will now go to question period.
[Translation]
Mr. Bachand.
Mr. Bachand (Saint-Jean): I greatly appreciated the opportunity to visit your community last year. I recall that you came to see me at my office and that I decided to come visit you in the course of the year. I believe that the visit took place during the holiday season last year and I enjoyed myself tremendously.
Mr. Chairman, I would simply like to point out that the Blood Tribe is one of the largest in Canada. Approximately 7,000 people live on the reserve. This is a highly organized community and I congratulate them on this achievement.
However, I know that this community is experiencing major problems in the area of post-secondary education. I have here a copy of a letter that I sent to the Minister in February of 1995 indicating to him that it was hard for me to accept that some students were unable to take certain courses owing to the lack of post-secondary education funding. I even recall that I pointed out to the Minister in an earlier letter that it was unclear whether we ourselves would agree, if we had always enjoyed free schooling for our children, to say to our son or daughter: You cannot go to school this year because we don't have the money to send you. Yet, that's what's happening in this community. I would like to put this question today to the members of the committee.
I want to state this publicly so that everyone understands that situations such as this are unacceptable. This is happening here at home!
I have a question regarding this matter. Last year, the Department of Indian Affairs boasted about having increased the budget by $20 million per year because of pressures. A problem was indeed noted. The department asked the First Nations to give it some ideas on how it should proceed. I see no other solution than to increase government funding.
My first question is this: Given the overall $20 million increase, did your community receive additional funding for post-secondary education? It was stated in the budget that some of the problems could likely be resolved by allocating an additional $20 million to post-secondary education.
Regarding my second question, I have here a letter sent to me by the Minister in response to my letter. It states that the First Nations signatory to Treaty no 7 have initiated legal proceedings, particularly against Alberta which has withheld its funding for post-secondary education.
In February, documents were supposed to be released regarding this matter. Is this case now before the courts?
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Have legal proceedings been initiated to ensure compliance with the funding provisions and those contained in Treaty no 7? If so, what is the status of these proceedings? I would like to come back to my first question, which to my mind is even more important. Have the additional $20 million allocated had a positive impact on your community?
[English]
Ms Smallface-Marule: Because of the particular funding formula the department developed, the so-called equity funding formula, the share of that $20 million that filtered to the Blood Tribe was $137,000.
The formula again favours those bands that are under-utilizing the program. It gives them more money, with which they can then add on to the rates they pay students or provide more administrative support services to the program. It does not mean more students are going to be sent to post-secondary education.
For us it does, but we are discriminated against because we're a high user of the program and we are told we're over-utilizing the program. Yet I've argued in here and I have a document in here that gives the reasons that the equitable funding formula is discriminatory to the Blood Tribe.
We welcome the $20 million, but we didn't get the benefit of it. I don't believe we got adequate benefit from it. Certainly this year we haven't either. We had less than a 2% increment this year in our program and I think it amounted to about that much money again this year. We're severely underfunded while some bands are overfunded, in my estimation.
In terms of your second question, Old Sun Community College initiated a legal suit against the Alberta government because the Alberta government has been finding one way or another to avoid providing any money on reserve for adult vocational, technical or post-secondary education. We do not get access to the grants that are available to other institutions, public and private, in Alberta if we're on reserve.
In addition, for the UCEP program our students used to be able to access grants and loans through the Alberta Students Finance Board. This year we've been denied that access, so our students at Red Crow College do not receive any benefits.
For all intents and purposes the distribution of moneys transferred from the federal government to the Alberta government, which include per capita formulas, discriminates against the Indians on reserve. One of the requests and recommendations here is that those moneys, which should go to first nations in Alberta, be removed from the amounts transferred to the Alberta government and channelled through INAC for distribution directly to first nations. Otherwise we have no access to or benefit from those moneys.
I'd like to point out that at our first nations college, Red Crow Community College, we have identified that we're providing adult upgrading and are far more successful than other mainstream institutions, private or public, in the success rate of our students in completing their upgrading training. As well, we're doing it for over $2,000 less per student per year than any mainstream institution.
We think it is really important that the federal government look closely at more adequately resourcing our first nations colleges. Look at what the U.S. government has done in terms of legislation for tribally controlled colleges and using that as a means of supporting the tremendous need for adult vocational, technical and post-secondary education.
I can't emphasize that enough. You have to look at the existing inequities in the Indian studies support program. A college like the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College receives $5.6 million. From that same program Red Crow Community College until this year was receiving only $225,000. We're training at least 300 students per year, and that's at least one-third of what Saskatchewan Indian Federated College is providing.
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Does that provide an answer to you?
The Chairman: Thank you very much.
[Translation]
We will now hear from the Liberals.
Mr. Murphy.
[English]
Mr. Murphy (Annapolis Valley - Hants): Welcome to you, Marie, Arnold and Narcisse.
I hear very clearly your presentation. It's really built around funding, and the question from Mr. Bachand made some of the difficulties clearer.
I don't need to question you about the funding because I think you've articulated it very well. One of the things we're looking at in terms of this committee is the good things that are happening in our educational systems, in your system, that we can use and use as best practices to maybe help somewhere along the way.
I'm wondering if you could articulate for us some of the good things that are happening with your educational program within the school. Also, are there other difficulties we should hear about? And my third question would be along the lines of when people are coming out of your program, are you tracking them with regard to job and job opportunities and sustained employment?
Those are the three areas I would like to hear from you on. Thank you.
Ms Smallface-Marule: Our first group of social work students were existing employees of our social service agencies on the reserve who needed their skills upgraded to meet the requirements when we were taking over some of these programs for the employees. About 23 started and we graduated 10 of them with diplomas. Some of the students who started had problems with their employers, because they initially tried to do the skills upgrading on, say, one-day-a-week courses, and the demands of their employment often prevented them from being able to attend every week.
We then tried to do an intensified summer program for them, and some of the employers would not give them the education leave for four months to do a four-month summer course. But we were really pleased with the results, and Mount Royal College has written us letters complimenting our students both in the business administration and in the social work program. Quite a number of our students were on the dean's list and the quality of our students has been constantly complimented by both their instructors and the program coordinators at Mount Royal College.
I feel that has been very successful and that the success is due to a large extent because they're studying in their own community. That kind of class spirit and communication of our members creates a good studying and supportive environment for students. The instructors have also really believed that our college provided an excellent environment for that kind of program.
Our adult educational students, again, are UCEP students. We have an 80% success, minimum. One year we had almost 100% success in terms of graduating the grade 12 students that attended Red Crow. These are adult students who are trying to upgrade their skills to obtain diplomas so they can meet the requirements of post-secondary institutions.
We go according to basic skills one, two and three. Basic skills one is literacy through grade 4. Basic skills two is grade 5 to grade 9, and basic skills three is grade 9, 10, 11, until you enter into our UCEP program, the university college and/or college entrance preparatory program.
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At our basic skills two level, we've had up to a 60% success there, which is excellent for that group. Once we've got them past basic skills two, in basic skills three and at the UCEP level, we usually do not lose very many students. The most difficult ones are at the basic skills one and two levels. Even there, our results are about three times higher than the off-reserve institutions.
In fact, Shane Gurney, who is a district officer for the human resources development department, has asked Red Crow College to consider offering courses in the town of Lethbridge because they have found so little success in sending aboriginal people to institutions in Lethbridge for adult upgrading and they've been impressed with our results at Red Crow.
We did a survey last summer of our adult population 19 years and over. We distributed 1,000 questionnaires and 702 were returned. These were fairly evenly divided between male and female respondents. Surprisingly, they were evenly divided in age categories of about 10-year periods.
We found that the majority of those who responded to our questionnaire did not have an advanced diploma; 93% did not. In appendix II I have put the results of that and our projection, therefore, of the level of need for adult education on the Blood reserve.
According to our figures, our maximum capacity at Red Crow College is 350 students per year. It would take us 22.48 years to meet the minimum five-year need. It's all outlined in the supporting documentation here.
That's the down-side. We have a large number of people who do not have high school diplomas, which is often the minimum requirement for advanced training in vocational or technical education. Therefore, to have our people prepared.... That's pretty well required now for any adequate employment. The positive thing is that the Blood Tribe has been making great strides in developing long-term planning and five-year strategic plans in every area.
A lot of our service delivery agencies on the reserve are what we call independent entities, to some extent, from the Blood Tribe administration, such as the Kainai board of education, the Red Crow board of governors, the Blood Tribe agricultural program, the Kainai corrections program, the Blood Tribe health commission, the family and community support services, the St. Paul's Addictions Treatment Centre, etc. They're all semi-autonomous from the Blood Tribe administration.
Each of us has been meeting monthly to develop integrated planning to coordinate our efforts. That is one of the most positive things that is happening in our community. We're combining our efforts and resources to address the issues that confront our community.
The Chairman: Mr. Bonin.
Mr. Bonin (Nickel Belt): Thank you very much for being here.
Your presentation touched mainly on obtaining more funding. Personally, I'm not confident that this is a simple process. I don't expect lots of money to be flowing and I would hate to have spent the number of hours this committee has spent trying to find solutions with dollars and then missing the boat in helping, and we are sincere in trying to help get a better product for the communities.
You just told us that there are 350 students in your college.
Ms Smallface-Marule: Yes.
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Mr. Bonin: Is the $137,000 additional funding over and above what you were getting before?
Ms Smallface-Marule: I should correct that. Red Crow Community College is primarily an adult educational institution, and therefore only a few of our students receive support from the post-secondary student support program.
Mr. Bonin: That's not divided into 350 students?
Ms Smallface-Marule: No, we're supporting over 400 students under the post-secondary student support program, and only about 45 to 50 of those are at Red Crow Community College in our UCEP program.
Mr. Bonin: I'm not clear. Is the additional $137,000 shared by 350, or by 45 to 50 students?
Ms Smallface-Marule: That is shared by 419 students.
Mr. Bonin: Were those moneys of direct benefit to the students or to the college?
Ms Smallface-Marule: That money was of direct benefit to the students.
As outlined in appendix 1, I've broken down the number of students we have been supporting. If you turn to the third page, I've shown for 1991-92, 1992-93, 1993-94, 1994-95 and 1995-96 how many we've supported over the summer, the fall and winter, and the winter. You'll see that this year we've had to reduce drastically the number of students we've funded, because we were in deficit. We had a $780,000 deficit.
Last year we supported 418 students for the fall and winter, an additional 49 students for the winter, and 118 students for the summer, for a total of 584 students.
Mr. Bonin: With the $137,000?
Ms Smallface-Marule: With the $137,000 extra.
Mr. Bonin: The additional funds made it easier for the students, but the college's operating costs were increased, and that's why you're in a deficit.
Ms Smallface-Marule: No.
Mr. Bonin: We need to know this. We need to get this on the record.
Ms Smallface-Marule: The deficit is in the post-secondary student support program. On the fourth page of appendix 1, we show the breakdown of how that money was spent.
Mr. Bonin: Help us out with the pages and numbers.
Ms Smallface-Marule: Okay. Books and tuition were $1.2 million in 1994-95; and training allowance, $3.2 million. The total for tuition, books and training allowance was $4.4 million. Our administration costs were less than 5% of that, for the grand total of our costs. I've broken that down.
So the administration is simply the three counsellors we hire, who coordinate that program and who advise those students, and the financial clerk who cuts the cheques and keeps the books for that program.
In fact, Red Crow Community College is subsidizing the post-secondary student program, because it doesn't pay rent and it doesn't pay for utilities. In addition, most of the support service costs for facsimiles, facsimile material, photocopy material and additional financial administration costs are covered by Red Crow Community College.
Mr. Bonin: I'm glad you have had an opportunity to put that record. It's important to put things on record.
I'll try to be brief, Mr. Chairman. I understood that there's unfairness in the formula for distributing the additional $20 million. Is that correct?
Ms Smallface-Marule: There is for all of the post-secondary student support funds, not just the $20 million.
Mr. Bonin: We'll close in on this, because this is something we can probably address. What is your recommendation to make it fair?
Ms Smallface-Marule: I believe the program has to be uncapped, it has to be based upon a process of discussions as to the adequate level of resources for student training needs, and it should be based upon the demand and need. I believe it will level off, whereas ours will peak and go down, while others will go up and peak.
I'm not saying there is necessarily more money needed. When you combine social services dollars that are spent now on people who should be in school and the post-secondary money, I don't believe you need more money. It is just a better use of the money and a more positive application of it.
Mr. Bonin: Who should make the decision?
Ms Smallface-Marule: I think we should, as first nations people, and I think we have to -
Mr. Bonin: You should get together and work something out. Is there a process under way now for your communities to do that?
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Ms Smallface-Marule: Yes, we work together in Treaty No. 7, and we have worked together with the other first nation colleges in Alberta. In fact, I've appended to this document our report on post-secondary and adult education for Alberta - it's appendix 4.
Mr. Bonin: Okay.
Ms Smallface-Marule: We've worked together on doing that review, putting forward our recommendations, for our Blue Quills, Yellowhead Tribal Council, Maskwachees, Old Sun, and Red Crow Community College, along with the directors of post-secondary education in Treaty No. 7. We've been working together and we believe we can work together in the Alberta region to come up with a more reasonable approach to the use of resources, but in my estimation, it is inequitable all across the country.
Mr. Bonin: Thank you. Do you have a high school in your community?
Ms Smallface-Marule: We have a high school.
Mr. Bonin: The cost of educating in the college is, did I hear you say $10,000 per student?
Ms Smallface-Marule: No, I'm saying that in the post-secondary student support program, for our students who are attending, say, U of L, Lethbridge Community College, Mount Royal College - off the reserve - the average cost, including training allowance for people with dependants and so on, is less than $10,000 per student.
Mr. Bonin: How much is it at the college per full-time student?
Ms Smallface-Marule: The college is spending just over $5,000 per full-time student.
Mr. Bonin: How much is it in your high schools?
Ms Smallface-Marule: About the same.
Mr. Bonin: So alternative -
Ms Smallface-Marule: But at Lethbridge Community College it's over $7,000 per student, according to their annual report.
Mr. Bonin: Are the upgrading programs under the high school jurisdiction or that of the college?
Ms Smallface-Marule: They're under the college jurisdiction. We received private school status, though, for our high school programs, and we're in the process of receiving that Alberta Education recognition of our other upgrading programs below high school.
Mr. Bonin: Okay then, I'll finish with this. This is where I'm going: if it would be under the high school program, would you not get more funding from the province than you are getting under the college program?
Ms Smallface-Marule: They do not fund anything on our reserve, high school or otherwise.
Mr. Bonin: That's all funded by DIAND.
Ms Smallface-Marule: The federal government, yes.
Mr. Bonin: You're saying it's the same cost under the high school jurisdiction as it is under the college jurisdiction.
Ms Smallface-Marule: I believe so.
Mr. Bonin: I find that very interesting. But if you say it, I believe you.
Ms Smallface-Marule: Yes, it is, because Red Crow College is operating the alternate school, which is for the high-risk youth between the ages of 17 and 21 who have dropped out of high school. We receive that transfer from INAC to Red Crow College to educate those youth. It is on the same basis as that received by the high school.
Mr. Bonin: Would a student not get two months more of education under the high school program than they do under the college program?
Ms Smallface-Marule: No, we operate on a 10-month academic year.
Mr. Bonin: The college does?
Ms Smallface-Marule: Yes, it does for the upgrading programs, but not the post-secondary, because we operate those under the brokerage system and under the same conditions as other colleges.
Mr. Bonin: Good, I appreciate the information, and it's important to get it on record. Thank you.
The Chairman: Thank you very much. I guess this draws to a close our meeting with you.
I'd like to thank you very much, Ms Smallface, Mr. Fox and Mr. Blood. It was very interesting, and your comments and recommendations will surely help us in our report to the standing committee.
For the members of the subcommittee, our next meeting is October 19,
[Translation]
from 10 a.m. to 12 noon in this room. At this time, we will hear from two groups: Mr. Linklater on behalf of the Assembly of First Nations, and the Indigenous Education Coalition.
[English]
Our next meeting is October 19, right here, from 10 a.m. to noon. We're receiving two groups. One is Mr. Linklater, from the Assembly of First Nations. The second group is the Indigenous Education Coalition.
Thank you very much. The meeting is adjourned.