Responding to the graves of 215 Children at the Kamloops Residential School

The uncovering of the truth, that there are at least 215 children buried at the Kamloops residential school, sits heavy with all of us. As we have embarked on a deeper journey of wrestling with the truth of colonization and as we have listened to residential school survivors, we remember that we have often heard stories of the children who “didn’t make it”; the children who “disappeared” and of the many who died afterwards from the impacts of abuse suffered in residential schools. Why have we treated indigenous people’s lives as so much less valuable? Why do we continue to?

Langevin School has been renamed, effectively immediately, by the Calgary Board of Education!

In an emergency vote last night, the Calgary Board of Education Trustees voted to rename the school. Langevin School was named after Hector-Louis Langevin. Langevin was instrumental in promoting and implementing Residential Schools across what we call Canada. The Residential School system was designed with the explicit purpose of assimilating Indigenous Peoples into western society.

Every person, and every community, has experienced some type of loss since the pandemic began in early 2020. Grief is a natural human experience that we may be feeling. This toolkit is to help us think, act, and change through our grief stories, making them meaningful to us and our communities.