Children

Protecting Our Children" NICWA Conference

Event: Protecting Our Children - NICWA Conference
Date: April 20-23, 2008
Time: See the event brochure below for conference schedule.
Location: Sheraton Bloomington Hotel
7800 Normandale Blvd.
Bloomington, MN 55439

Details: Celebrating 30 Years of the Indian Child Welfare Act: Keeping the Promise

Contact Info: For more information contact (503) 222-4044 or visit www.nicwa.org/conference/

Details: Event Brochure (PDF Document)

Protecting Our Children National American Indian Conference on Child Abuse Neglect

Type of Event: Conference
Hosted By: NICWA
Event Dates: 4/20/2008 - 4/23/2008
Event Location: Minneapolis, MN
Contact: Isla Dane
Contact Phone:503-222-4044
Website: http://www.nicwa.org/conference/

Course Description:This year’s conference will focus on the future of Indian child welfare and how each of us—tribal leaders, ICW workers, and other stakeholders—share the important responsibility in continuing this work. Workshops and presentations will feature innovative strategies to effectively meet the needs of our children and families through strong, collaborative partnerships.

How to Register: http://www.nicwa.org/conference/

Iowa Children’s Water Festival,
May 8
Des Moines Area Community College, Ankeny.

Volunteers, presenters and donations to support the festival are being recruited now! The festival is a "Splash of Educational Fun" for approximately 2,300 fifth graders from communities across Iowa. This fun, hands on learning experience includes classroom instruction, an exhibit hall, games and much more concerning all the many aspects of water. Contact: Laura Ceretti, (515) 283-8705, ceretti_at_dmww.com.

This is one of the most powerful speeches I have ever seen given (I was able to catch the whole speech in bits and pieces as people were reporting about it through YouTube) and it is even more powerful once read.

Why? Rudd enacts with this as law an acknowledgment that white privilege is founded on government policies that sought to make Aborigine Australians extinct.

Here's the quote :

The uncomfortable truth for us all is that the parliaments of the nation, individually and collectively, enacted statutes and delegated authority under those statutes that made the forced removal of children on racial grounds fully lawful.

There is a further reason for an apology as well: it is that reconciliation is in fact an expression of a core value of our nation - and that value is a fair go for all.

There is a deep and abiding belief in the Australian community that, for the stolen generations, there was no fair go at all.

There is a pretty basic Aussie belief that says that it is time to put right this most outrageous of wrongs.

It is for these reasons, quite apart from concerns of fundamental human decency, that the governments and parliaments of this nation must make this apology - because, put simply, the laws that our parliaments enacted made the stolen generations possible.

We, the parliaments of the nation, are ultimately responsible, not those who gave effect to our laws. And the problem lay with the laws themselves.

As has been said of settler societies elsewhere, we are the bearers of many blessings from our ancestors; therefore we must also be the bearer of their burdens as well.

Therefore, for our nation, the course of action is clear: that is, to deal now with what has become one of the darkest chapters in Australia's history.

In doing so, we are doing more than contending with the facts, the evidence and the often rancorous public debate.

In doing so, we are also wrestling with our own soul.

Full text after the jump

Australia Says Sorry to Stolen Generation

Apology Speech by Kevin Rudd 13th February 2008 to the Stolen Generation.

Part 1. A little History
Part 2. Personal Interviews
Part 3. Footage from Australian supporters
Part 4. Apology Speech by Kevin Rudd

The Stolen Generation is a term used to describe the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, who were removed from their families by Australian government agencies and church missions, under various state acts of parliament, denying the rights of parents and making all Aboriginal children wards of the state, between approximately 1869 and 1969. The policy typically involved the removal of children into internment camps, orphanages and other institutions.

I have been moved to tears by the incredible gesture of Australia's Parliament under their new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd.

Eleven years ago a study was published under the title Bringing Them Home | "Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families". The study was the height of a coalition of Aboriginal groups and human rights organizations who had fought for years to force the Australian government to blow the lid off the years of its genocidal policy against Aboriginal Australians.

“We’ve worn handmade peace shirts every Thursday since the first week of school, without fail,” Skylar said.

But what started out as a light-hearted gesture soon started to be taken out of context.

Students started approaching the group members, yelling obscene things at them, said Lauren.

“People just turned on us like that,” she said. “At least 10 boys stood up and yelled things at me at once, and we couldn’t even walk through the halls without a harsh comment being made.”

The heckling began early in the school year, according to group members. They said they were putting small posters promoting peace on friends’ lockers with their permission.

They thought it was OK, because the cheerleaders and football players had signs on theirs. Eventually, though, group members said they were told by the school’s administration they could no longer hang up the posters.

“People tore them down and drew swastikas and ‘white power’ stuff on them,” Lauren said.

Skylar had similar things written on her posters.

“Someone taped an ‘I Love Bush’ sign over my ‘Wage Peace’ sign,” she said. “So I tore it down, threw it away, and the whole commons starting booing. I walk by later and find that someone has completely tore my sign down and placed an ‘I Love America, Because America Loves War’ sign up.”

—Students Wear Confederate Flag Shirts To Oppose Peace-Shirt Group, commondreams.org | sombrero tip to C&L