Today, September 30, we want everyone to stop and acknowledge the National Day of Truth and Reconciliation.   This annual day of commemoration is to honour the children who never returned home and the Survivors of residential schools, along with their families and communities.  The creation of the federal statutory holiday was approved by Parliament, days after the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation confirmed the discovery of roughly 200 potential burial sites, likely of children, on the site of a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C. 

Weeks later, the Cowessess First Nation announced a preliminary finding of 751 unmarked graves at a cemetery near the former Marieval Indian Residential School east of Regina. Since then, more than 300 other potential burial sites have been identified, and searches continue at sites across Canada. What are residential schools? 
More than 150,000 First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were forced to attend church-run, government-funded schools between the 1870s and 1997. 

In 1894, the Indian Act was amended to authorize the government to remove an Indigenous child from their family if it was felt they were not being properly cared for or educated and place them in a school. Subsequent amendments to the act in 1920 further reinforced compulsory attendance at the schools.  
Children were removed from their families and culture and forced to learn English, embrace Christianity and adopt the customs of Canada's white majority. 

Many of the children at residential schools were physically, sexually or psychologically abused in a system, described by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in its landmark 2015 report, as cultural genocide, part of a collective, calculated effort to eradicate Indigenous language and culture. 
The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, which houses the material collected by the TRC, has identified the names of, or information about, more than 4,100 children who died while attending these schools, most due to malnourishment or disease. 

But former senator Murray Sinclair, who chaired the TRC, has said he believes the death toll could be much higher because of the schools' poor burial records, 6,000 or more. We encourage everyone to wear orange today, in solidarity with Orange Shirt Day, "Every Child Matters."  

The day has been marked in past years as Orange Shirt Day, originally started in 2013. The day honours residential school survivor Phyllis Webstad, who had her orange shirt taken away on the first day of school. 
 
Numerous activities will take place across the country today, please join these if you are available to, showing your support. You can also join the national commemorative gathering, broadcast live from Parliament Hill.  To learn more about National Truth and Reconciliation Day, or to learn what you can do as a union member to support truth and reconciliation, please reach out to the 4070 Committee Against Racism and Discrimination (C.A.R.D. Committee) atcard@cupe4070.ca.  

If you or someone you know is a residential school survivor, and in need of support, please call the Residential School Survivor Support Line: 1-866-925-4419