Since the date of September 30, 2018 falls on a Sunday, our board will recognize Orange
Shirt Day on Friday September 28, 2018 in the spirit of reconciliation and hope for the
future generations.
The Orange Shirt Day movement started in 2013 to highlight the pain and suffering of thousands of Indigenous children who were sent to residential school throughout the last century. The colour of the shirt is connected to the experience of Phyllis Webstad who was sent to Cariboo Residential School near Williams Lake, BC, in 1973. Six-years old at the time, Phyllis went to her first day of school wearing a new bright orange shirt. New clothes were a rare thing for the young girl, who was being raised by her grandmother. However, upon arriving at the school, the nuns stripped her of the shirt, forcing her to wear the school’s institutional uniform. Webstad has felt the impact of that event long after it occurred, “that feeling of worthlessness and insignificance, ingrained in me from my first …
The Orange Shirt Day movement started in 2013 to highlight the pain and suffering of thousands of Indigenous children who were sent to residential school throughout the last century. The colour of the shirt is connected to the experience of Phyllis Webstad who was sent to Cariboo Residential School near Williams Lake, BC, in 1973. Six-years old at the time, Phyllis went to her first day of school wearing a new bright orange shirt. New clothes were a rare thing for the young girl, who was being raised by her grandmother. However, upon arriving at the school, the nuns stripped her of the shirt, forcing her to wear the school’s institutional uniform. Webstad has felt the impact of that event long after it occurred, “that feeling of worthlessness and insignificance, ingrained in me from my first …