Mt. Baker’s Ktunaxa flag hoisted sky-high for National Indigenous Peoples Day

Indigenous representatives, educators and students gathered outside of Mount Baker Secondary School on June 15 to observe the raising of the Ktunaxa Nation flag.

The event happens annually at the school in the days leading up to National Indigenous Peoples Day on June 21. Members of Ktunaxa First Nation and Rocky Mountain Métis Association delivered words of recognition to a crowd of people, and a drum group performed as the flag was hoisted into the sky.

“I think it’s a good way for the school district and the Ktunaxa Nation to share that we do have a partnership, and raising the flag is one way to symbolize that partnership,” Ktunaxa Nation Council chair Kathryn Teneese told the Townsman.

“[The education system is] an institution that wasn’t so long ago as welcoming and as friendly, but we’re working on that relationship and I think the flag raising is certainly one way to be able to symbolize the fact that we are moving forward together.”

“I attended Mt. Baker a long time ago. We certainly didn’t have these opportunities. It wasn’t available to us. A lot of things that people are talking about today simply were not part of the conversation in the past,” she added.

“Now we are having conversations about, in many instances, some difficult and disturbing truths that make people somewhat uncomfortable. The fact is, that in order for us to be able to move forward, we need to recognize that those truths are part of our lives and we do need to be able to learn from them.”

@gfrans15
gillian.francis@cranbrooktownsman.com
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Indigenous Truth and Reconciliation