Tuesday, June 16, 2015

SD52's Sm'algyax plans gaining notice beyond Prince Rupert

A plan starting this September to introduce the Sm'algyax language to all elementary school students enrolled with SD 52 is starting to catch attention far beyond the Prince Rupert and Port Edward.

Last week CBC's Daybreak North program was the first to outline the decision from SD52 officials, that will see the District expand their Sm'algyax language program to all of the district elementary schools at the Kindergarten to Grade 4 level.

In the interview, (which you can listen to here) Roberta Edzerza, the Aboriginal Education Principal for the District explained how the School District is approaching language education at the moment and outlined how the language program will work in the fall.

Early on in their efforts of the past to introduce the concept of Sm'algyax instruction to the region, School District 52 featured this information overview, which gives the reader more background on the language and traces the history of the language and the Tsimshian people.

As well, the efforts of School District 52 caught the attention of UNBC which created a Living legacy page related to the language back in 2003, though that project has not been updated since April of 2013.

More background,  on what's ahead for the fall of 2015 can be found below, through a number of media items related to last weeks announcement.

CFNR -- All Prince Rupert K-Grade 4 students to get Sm'algyax language instruction (audio)
CBC British Columbia -- Prince Rupert students must learn indigenous language from September
Vancouver Sun -- Prince Rupert elementary students to be taught the local First Nations language
Huffington Post -- Prince Rupert students to all learn First Nations Language

The move was also reported by the CBC's French language service Radio Canada

For more items related to School District 52 developments see our archive page here.

Cross posted from the North Coast Review

No comments:

Post a Comment