Youth share experiences, plans with UN

In the month of October, United Nations Special Rapporteur James Anaya visited Canada to examine the rights of Indigenous people.
During his trip, he met with First Nations, Inuit and Métis leaders, organizations and other people in numerous parts of Canada. Thunder Bay-based Feathers of Hope (FOH) was one of the groups Anaya sat down with in Ottawa at the end of his weeklong visit to Canada.
FOH hosted its first forum earlier this year in Thunder Bay with 150 youth from 91 First Nation communities in northern Ontario participating. During the weeklong event, the youth discussed culture and identity, education and skill development, recreation and programming, systems of care, and health. FOH then presented recommendations based on the findings at the forum to policy-makers in First Nations, federal, provincial, and municipal organizations. FOH is currently working on a report based on the data collected at the spring forum.
FOH youth “amplifiers” Julaine Trudeau and Uko Abara, from the Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth, were present with other FOH amplifiers during the meeting with Anaya to discuss with him their findings on Oct. 14.
“We basically condensed one of our usual presentations into one 10-minute presentation,” Abara explained of the meeting. “We talked about the experiences of the youth, the different recommendations that the youth came up with, our future plan, as well as the report.”
Trudeau said that the report would be released in January, along with an action plan.
“It was brief,” Trudeau said of the meeting with Anaya. “It was sort of hard to put a whole year’s worth of work into one meeting but I think we got our key messages out. He was very responsive in that we were doing work that would really affect the youth in First Nations communities. He said that we were on the right track.”
Trudeau said that Anaya told them it was good that FOH was not relying on other people to do the work for them.
“We’re more so about building partnerships that benefit First Nations youth and we are working on the solutions that came out of the FOH forum,” she said.
Abara said that FOH has met with various groups and people who are capable of affecting real change to the lives of First Nations people.
“They are pretty receptive so far,” he said. One of the main challenges is to have them focus on the youth, Abara explained.
“A lot of people focus on the logistics and costs and everything but at the end of the day, we want them to be able to focus on the people we are talking about.”
“It is difficult to get people to realize that all the decisions being made, all the environmental affects, that these things actually affect people and they’re affecting children and youth,” he said.
Trudeau said that even though FOH started out in northern Ontario and focuses on issues that affect the youth of the area, she has high hopes for the future of the group.
“Hopefully FOH will stand as a model that can be used to engage all First Nations youth in Canada,” Trudeau said.
Abara said that it is important to know that the main theme of FOH was “to examine and hear the experiences of First Nations youth in northern Ontario.”
“A lot of the youth have the same issues, even though we are focusing on northern Ontario, the effects and experiences can be applied in some context to different youth across the nation and across the world,” Abara added.
He said that FOH is now focusing on the action plan and report.
“Over the next few months we will be building partnerships with different organizations and communities, and stakeholders and politicians as well,” Abara said. “What we want is to build momentum so people are aware that this report exists, and that FOH exists, so they know there are First Nations youth who want to make positive change in their communities.”
For anyone looking to become involved in FOH or to support its cause, Abara said that social media was the best way to get a hold of them.
“We post different opportunities that we have available to youth, and updates. If we ever need support that’s where we will post it a lot of the time,” Abara said.
FOH can be found on Twitter (@FOHTbay) as well as Facebook (Facebook.com/FOHTBAY).