The University of Toronto’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health (DLSPH) provides knowledge of public health knowledge through degrees, workshops, and events to foster socially justice-minded learning. The proposed training, (GTA ICS Micro Credential), will begin participants cultural safety journey through four key areas in Indigenous cultural safety (see link of overall project with micro-credential highlighted). First, they will learn about appropriate versus stereotyped terminology. This will highlight the ways in which participants might have inadvertently been creating a culturally insensitive environment simply with their words. Additionally, participants will learn about the use and accountability of land acknowledgements and positionality. Second, participants will learn about what traditional medicines including tobacco or seema (Ojibwe word for tobacco) and how it is used when engaging with Indigenous communities – specifically with some First Nations Peoples and communities. Using Kirkness and Barnhardt’s (1991) Four R’s of respect, relevance, reciprocity and responsibility, participants will be introduced how to avoid violating cultural protocols, norms and worldviews. Third, participants will learn about local Toronto area treaties and appropriated lands with Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee and contemporary First Nations, Inuit and Métis residents in the GTA to contextualize the discrimination and systemic racism that Indigenous Peoples encounter daily. To highlight Indigenous Peoples’ connection with land and environment in an academic way, participants are encouraged to attempt self-directed land-based learning activities. It is important to acknowledge the historical and cultural context in which discriminatory language and ideas were formed in order to actively dismantle them. As such, the final component will include sensitive topics, such as residential schools, the Sixties and Millennial Scoops, the Indian Act, Indian hospitals and contemporary issues (i.e., Murdered & Missing Indigenous Women & Girls, over-representation in criminal justice, and access to health and education services). Specifically, participants will hear how these sociopolitical and historical events relate to post-secondary education and how this informs Indigenous peoples’ experience with health, social services, and education resources in contemporary times.

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If you are interested in cultural safety training, with or without land-based events/activities, please contact us at nrcs.dlsph@utoronto.ca