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This paper discusses the findings of a research study that gathered and analyzed recruitment and retention strategies employed by 50 teacher education programs (TEPs) in Canada, the United States, New Zealand, and Australia to increase the number of Indigenous teachers. It discusses several recruitment and retention strategies that were found to be successful in this regard, highlighting the importance of facilitating access, eliminating financial barriers, and offering Indigenous-centric programs.

This article seeks to contribute to the knowledge base regarding efforts to increase the supply of employed Indigenous teachers. In addition to supporting the learning and well-being of Indigenous students, increasing Indigenous teachers is critical for remote Indigenous communities with chronically understaffed schools. This study was conducted as a scoping review of 50 Teacher Education Programs (TEPs) across Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States that have enacted efforts to increase Indigenous teachers. The study found a range of effective strategies, and this article will depict three strategies that can be enacted by TEPs to support Indigenous teacher graduates as they transition to employment. The strategies are: (1) creating employment opportunities; (2) identifying community needs and collaborating over practicum placements; and (3) providing ongoing support. The article concludes with a call for collaboration, funding, and data collection for the continued evaluation and improvement of strategies to increase Indigenous teachers.

In this paper we explain how teachers can subvert settler colonial epistemology in their classrooms and become 'imperfect accomplices.' Drawing on a larger project, we focus on the ways non-Indigenous teachers understood their role in teaching Indigenous content and epistemologies through their lenses of 'fear,' which we re-theorize as 'anxiety.' These anxieties were enacted by the educators in two ways: stopping the teaching of Indigenous content and epistemologies, or using productive pausing for self-reflection. We explain how stopping the teaching outside of settler colonial epistemology is based on structures that impose fear to go outside of that epistemology. We then examine how some teachers pause within these structures of 'fear' and explain three strategies to become 'imperfect accomplices.'

Deepening Knowledge Project, through Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), undertook research within the Initial Teacher Education program to explore the relationships between teacher candidates and Aboriginal content. Our research question was, "Which strategies used within OISE's Central cohort are most powerful in increasing teacher candidates' willingness and readiness to incorporate Aboriginal knowledges and pedagogies into their classroom practice?" Data consisted of surveys administered to approximately 70 teacher candidates at three key points in their program as well as two rounds of interviews with five purposively selected participants. We found that teacher candidates most appreciated the inclusion of First Voice perspectives, in-depth instruction on current and historical events, and a continuous examination of privilege as means to prepare them for incorporating Aboriginal content into their future practice. While most students reported feeling more confident and willing to include Aboriginal perspectives near the end of their program, there are three commonly stated questions, reported on preprogram surveys that lead to inaction on Aboriginal inclusion. Addressing these questions directly should help encourage more teachers to take up Aboriginal perspectives in their classrooms.

This paper details a research project dedicated to honouring Mushkegowuk Cree concepts of land, environment and life in Fort Albany First Nation. Community youth interviewed local Elders to produce an audio documentary about the relations of the people to their traditional territory. These interactions evolved into a 10-day river trip with youth, adult and elder participants traveling together on their traditional waters and lands learning about the meaning of paquataskamik, the Cree word used for traditional territory, all of the environment, nature, and everything it contains. Bringing generations of community members together on the land led to reclamation of culture and indigenous knowledge and built greater community resistance to external forms of economic exploitation and development.

In this paper we propose that collaborative action research values, goals and practices have much in common with guiding principles for conducting research with educators and community members in First Nation, Inuit and Metis communities, as outlined in the Task Force on Aboriginal Languages and Cultures on Aboriginal Languages and Cultures' (2005) document. We draw on experiences in the Northern Oral Language and Writing through Play Partnership project to make our case, and conclude by identifying needed shifts in expectations and values within the broader academic community for conducting educational research in Indigenous communities.

American Indian environmental ethics: An Ojibwa case study J. Baird Callicott and Michael P. Nelson. 2004. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson/Prentice Hall. ix, 163pp. ISBN: 0-13-043121-4. Cdn. $19.00 (paper). American [...]

This article focuses on the creation, implementation, experiences, and research surrounding the first online professional development course for principals of First Nations schools across Canada, named the First Nations Schools' Principals Course (FNSPC). First, we describe the contexts, goals, and designing of the FNSPC. Second, we outline the complexities of bringing Indigenous values into an online educatmial space. Lastly, we describe how using the Five R's (Kirkness & Earnhardt, 2001; Restoule, 2008) of respect, relevance, reciprocity, responsibility, and relationships recasts the challenges of Indigenizing online education into opportunities for spaces of traditional and non-traditional Indigenous learning through the FNSPC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gillian Weiss, ed, with Pearl McKenzie, Pauline Coulthard, Charlene Tree, Bernie Sound, Valerie Bourne, and Brandi McLeod, Trying to Get It Back: Indigenous Women, Education and Culture. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid [...]

African diasporic and North American Indigenous communities have both been greatly impacted by the colonization of the Americas. Historic and contemporary relations between these communities have been fraught with complex commonalities, contradictions and conflicts. These communities have remained connected across time and space through their shared and distinct histories of resistance and oppression. Both communities have suffered the embodiment of systemic violence in the form of elevated rates of communicable and chronic diseases such as HIV. This paper examines the decolonizing potential of collaboration between these two communities in their response to HIV. It begins by unpacking the history of racialized subjugation faced by Indigenous and African, Caribbean and Black communities in the Americas, with a focus on Canada. This background contextualizes empirical findings of an arts-based intervention that explored notions of identity, resistance and solidarity building between young people in these groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we report on the results of a community-based participatory research (CBPR) study conducted as part of the Gendering Adolescent AIDS Prevention (GAAP) project to provide insight into the ways colonialism is connected to issues of HIV risk faced by Aboriginal youth in Canada. The research took place in urban and on-reserve settings in two Canadian provinces: Ontario and Quebec. To obtain our results, we put out a call for youth facilitators who were responsible for convening a focus group in their community and recruiting youth participants. Prior to conducting the focus groups, the youth facilitators had one-on-one training with the GAAP coordinator. In total, six focus groups were completed: three groups in urban settings and three groups on-reserve. The data were coded using Nud*ist qualitative data management software and collaboratively analyzed for themes. In their focus group discussion, youth made links between ongoing colonialism and problems in their community today and discussed the relevance for HIV vulnerability. They talked about the stigma and fear associated with HIV/AIDS and stressed the importance of Elders taking a leadership role in educating their communities about HIV/AIDS. We discuss the relevance of these findings for Aboriginal communities and we stress the importance of recognizing Aboriginal youth as a powerful resource for HIV prevention work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a group of concerned stakeholders, we came together to envision decolonizing approaches to respond to the elevated rates of HIV in Aboriginal communities in Canada using participatory arts-based methodologies. In total, over 100 youth worked with 20 artists in six different Indigenous community workshops to create artistic pieces that unpacked the connections between individual risk and structural inequalities. Eighty-five enrolled in our study and seventy-one youth participated in individual interviews six weeks after the workshops. Four pieces are described here in depth: The Kahnawá:ke First Nation and Montreal urban Aboriginal youth Stop Motion Film; (2) The urban Aboriginal community in Toronto, Ontario Hip Hop Track; (3) The Kettle and Stony Point & Aamjiwnaang First Nations "Rezpect" Mural and (4) The urban and on reserve youth around Charlottetown talking stick carvings. Each piece takes up the themes of decolonization as a primary vehicle for combating HIV, while placing the virus in the context of health, community, culture and agency. These approaches stress the communal, and engage with historic and ongoing oppression. Connecting youth with one another, as well as Aboriginal mentors, teachers, and artists, may in itself be a form of decolonization and reclamation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aspires to raise consciousness of the spiritual power of tobacco in a modern context and the responsibility of using tobacco ties as a research methodology. An ambitious project to outline traditional ways of doing research became a humbling teaching in the necessity of honouring tobacco and the spirit connections when tobacco is involved. We recount our journey in the project and what we learned about the meaning of tobacco to various First Nations (primarily those in northeastern Turtle Island), about doing research with Indigenous Elders, and about Indigenous research methodology. We reflect on the relationships activated when tobacco is part of a research methodology and share some of the teachings Elders shared with us about research, with a focus on their thoughts about tobacco offerings. It is not this work's intention to prescribe a proper set of steps or a how-to manual for using tobacco in social research. Rather, this article is an attempt to reflect on what it really means to honour the spirit in Aboriginal research, particularly as it is embodied in tobacco. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors reflect on connecting to the spirit in Indigenous research. They define spirit as a mysterious energy pervading the universe and giving life energy, note the importance of reclaiming and redefining research from the perspective of Indigenous people highlighted in various articles within the issue, such as how researchers connect to spirit in their research, and the ways that Indigenous research is distinct from other research approaches, such as through the location of self.

In research with urban Aboriginal men from the Toronto area, it was found that families inherently passed on Indigenous cultural values regardless of how explicitly the parents taught these values to their children. Aboriginal cultural values are ingrained in the families and are passed down such that they may be communicated and absorbed implicitly. The values of respect, love, autonomy, family, acceptance, ingenuity, and ability to adapt as they are uniquely interpreted in Indigenous cultures were mentioned by the participants as those cherished by their families. Employing a learning circle methodology revealed some of the historical or social influences that affected choices to identify openly as Aboriginal for members of diverse generations in the times and places where they lived. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: As a result of social and economic inequities, Indigenous youth globally are disproportionately vulnerable to HIV/AIDS. Canada's First Nations, Inuit, and Métis people are among them. In this paper, we discuss the collaborative community-based approach we adopted to uncover new possibilities for HIV prevention with Aboriginal youth that account for systemic inequities. This project is part of a larger Gendering Adolescent AIDS Prevention (GAAP) research agenda. Methods: We conducted 6 focus groups with 61 Aboriginal youth in Quebec and Ontario. An inductive approach guided analyses. Data were coded using Nud*ist qualitative data management software and collaboratively analyzed for main themes. Findings: Youth discussed their divergent understandings of the links between colonialism, traditional knowledge(s), and HIV risk in relation to gender inequities, stigma, and involving multiple stakeholders in the HIV response. Interpretation: New prevention approaches relating HIV risk to colonial legacies are necessary. Recommendations for future research and intervention development include: an analysis of systemic inequities in HIV prevention education, focusing on stigma reduction, building wide-spread community support, acknowledging diversity across Aboriginal peoples, and increasing active youth (peer) engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Akwesasne Science and Math Pilot Project, undertaken In Southeastern Ontario, is an attempt to increase the presence of Aboriginal students in these disciplines. The curriculum, which is described in this paper, emphasizes the cultural relevance that these subjects have in relation to the way of life of the Kanien'kehaka ('People of the Flint, also known In English as 'Mohawk'). By setting this innovative project and curriculum in its historical context, this paper illustrates how the project addresses inequities regarding Aboriginal controlof education. In addition, through a discussion of curriculum content and teaching methods, the potential for this project to contribute toward reducing social inequity and ecological unsustainability is indicated. By conjoining concerns of social equity and ecological sustainability this project expresses the important links we need to make between ecology and sociology, and also provides a vital response to some of the pressing problems facing contemporary Canathan society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community-based nurse researchers strive to develop collaborative partnerships that are meaningful to the health priorities of participants and relevant to their sociopolitical realities. Within the context of global inequity, intersecting forces of privilege and oppression inevitably shape the research process, resulting in tensions, contradictions, and challenges that must be addressed. This article has 3 purposes: to examine the political context of mining corporations, to describe common health threats and challenges faced by mining-affected communities, and to reflect on research with a mining-affected Indigenous community in Guatemala whose health and capacity for self-advocacy are impacted by a legacy of colonialism. Using an anti-colonial lens, the authors discuss 3 central tensions: community agency and community victimhood, common ground and distinct identities, and commitment to outcomes and awareness of limitations. They conclude by offering methodological suggestions for nurse researchers whose work is grounded in anti-colonial perspectives.