It’s “the right time” for a CEGEP in Nunavik

Every year, a third of the 60 to 70 high school graduates from the Kativik School Board in Nunavik go down to do their CEGEP “in the South.”

This 2,000 km journey partly explains the region’s 3% post-secondary graduation rate. Last spring, a report recommended the opening of a CEGEP in Nunavik to facilitate Inuit access to college studies.

“We’ve been talking about a CEGEP in Nunavik for 40 years,” says Lisa Mesher, assistant director general of the Kativik School Board, known in Inuktitut as “Kativik Ilisarniliriniq.” “We think this is the right time.”

A CEGEP could “normalize the post-secondary pathway,” argues James Vanderberg, a teacher and educational advisor for nearly 20 years in Kativik.

The cost of building a CEGEP in Nunavik would be $200 million, according to the Ministry of Education report. But the bill could double if new residences were built for teachers and students. The conversion of existing buildings is being considered.

A consultation took place last winter in the villages of Nunavik. “We hold public meetings, radio shows where we take calls, question sessions on Facebook, to reach as many people as possible,” explains Olivia Ikey, consultant for Kativik. “A lot of people tell us: ‘We have already been consulted on this and we want a CEGEP, why do we have to repeat it?’ It really has been a request for a long time.”

Certificates

In Nunavik, there are about twenty college training programs in collaboration with “Southern” CEGEPs. For example, for 20 years, the Saint-Félicien CEGEP has been offering a childhood education technique to educators employed by the Kativik regional government. The Marie-Victorin CEGEP in Montreal offers certificates in communication and support relationships to Inuit employees of the Nunavik health and social services network.

“But these are almost always independent programs, modeled on the certificates offered to companies,” says Mr. Vanderberg. “So the general public does not have access to these certification courses, since you have to be hired by the employers offering them in order to be able to register.”

Inuit culture

Since 2017, there has been a bridging program, Nunavik Sivunitsavut (Nunavik our future), a partnership between Kativik and the English-speaking John Abbott CEGEP. “We adapt the courses to the Inuit reality,” explains Mr. Vanderberg.

The one-year program, which is followed by about twenty students per year, consists of ten courses, five per session: English, social studies, physical education, Inuktitut and a complementary course, often in the arts. “In the social studies course, for example, we will talk about residential schools, treaties,” says Mr. Vanderberg. In English, works by Inuit authors are discussed.

Until this year, the courses were held at the Avataq Institute, dedicated to Inuit culture, on Sainte-Catherine Street in Westmount. Next year, they will be held in the Saint-Henri district.

Sarah Qumak, a 42-year-old student, enrolled in Nunavik Sivunitsavut after two attempts at university and several years of working as an English-French-Inuktitut interpreter in Montreal, where she raised her two daughters. “I wanted to do the program to learn more about my origins,” says Ms.^me Qumak.

For his part, Tukai Augiak, 18, decided to come and study in Montreal after completing his fifth year of secondary school in Gaspésie, with friends of his father. “It’s really good to meet Inuit from other villages,” he says. “We each have a different accent.”

Both give as an example a recent course on shamans.

Jimmy Uqittuq, who teaches the Inuktitut and art classes, also teaches the one that discussed Inuit shamanism. He has been teaching for 25 years and has spent most of his career in the North. “For a lot of students, the classes I teach on culture are very emotional because they realize things that were only mentioned by their parents. Another class that gets a lot of reactions is the one where I talk about the RCMP dog slaughters in the 1950s.”

Mr. Uqittuq, who is 46 years old, started teaching in Nunavik Sivunitsavut because he wanted to give his own children more educational choices in Montreal.

Most of the students are women. This year, there are five families, who live in apartments not far from the Nunavik Sivunitsavut premises. Single students live in the EVO university residence, a former hotel on the corner of Robert-Bourassa Boulevard and Saint-Antoine Street.

Trilingual education

Education in Kativik School Board schools is in the Inuktitut language until grade three. After that, half of the students go to the French-speaking sector, with language and culture classes in Inuktitut. The provisions of Bill 96, which impose additional French classes in English-speaking CEGEPs attended by Inuit, could constitute an additional obstacle to the academic success of Inuit.

The origins

The Nunavik Sivunitsavut program was adapted from a similar system for Nunavut students that has existed in Ottawa for 30 years. “Now there are post-secondary institutions in Nunavut, but the Nunavik Sivunitsavut program continues,” says Lynda Giguère, who directs the program after teaching nearly 15 years in Nunavik. Marie-Victorin, Montmorency and John Abbott CEGEPs have offered welcoming programs adapted to Inuit students coming down to the Montreal area for about 20 years, which facilitate the transition to post-secondary education.

A French version

A French-language adaptation of Nunavik Sivunitsavut is in preparation. “We want to improve the way things are done,” says M^me Giguère. She gives as an example the adaptation of hiring criteria to the expertise required for Mr. Uqittuq’s position. This adaptation of hiring criteria for certain professors could be planned from the outset by a French-language program.