Understanding Your Legal Options as a Sexual Abuse Survivor
Upcoming Online Event
If you've experienced sexual abuse, we're here to help.
We will discuss legal options for individuals who have experienced abuse in:
Children's Aid, Foster and/or Adoptive Homes
School
Church
Sports Organizations
Scouts and Big Brother Programs
And other Institutions
We will be answering questions such as:
How long do you have to press charges for sexual assault in Canada?
What is considered institutional sexual abuse?
What is involved in filing a sexual assault lawsuit?
And more...
Our presenters, which include members of The Sixties Scoop Network, The Sixties Scoop Indigenous Society of Alberta, The Sixty Scoop Indigenous Society of BC, and Jellinek Ellis Gluckstein Lawyers will help attendees navigate the supports, resources and resolutions they may need as survivors of abuse.
This webinar will also provide further information for 60s Scoop Survivors, including what legal options are available for survivors beyond the class action, while also answering questions for those who have suffered childhood abuse.
This is a free Zoom event, if you wish to attend, please click the "Register Now" button on the right.
August 12, 2022
We are excited to announce the Sixties Scoop Network (SSN) in collaboration with KAIROS Canada has successfully secured funding from the Sixties Scoop Healing Foundation. As a recipient, this funding will further support the Bigwen 60s Scoop Healing Initiatives and Debwewin In our own Words: Mapping the 60s Scoop Diaspora project. These are vital healing and cultural initiatives for Sixties Scoop survivors and their families. The Sixties Scoop Network (SSN) will proceed with organizing a fall 60s Scoop gathering for survivors along with cultural, training and healing opportunities in 2023.
In particular, the Debwewin In our own Word: Mapping the 60s Scoop Diaspora GIS mapping project will continue to advance opportunities for survivors who have been taken out of the country and overseas to share their stories through video on the digital mapping platform. A new interface and searchable database will also be incorporated into the map to make the digital map user friendly on phones.
We would like to thank KAIROS Canada and the United Church of Canada for supporting our application and our intermediary partners in accessing funds. KAIROS Canada has been a long time supporter of Indigenous grassroots work including MMIW2SG, ecological justice and Indigenous rights.
Background
The Sixties Scoop Network (SSN) formerly National Indigenous Survivors of Child Welfare Network is a grassroots collective of 60s Scoop survivors in Ottawa. We have successfully held four national gatherings held in Ottawa bringing together 60s scoop survivors from all over Canada and overseas with the common goal of building community, healing and reclaiming cultural knowledge. The SSN has served as advisors for the Legacy of Hope Bigiwen: Coming Home – Truth telling from the Sixties Scoop, participated as a collaborator for Dr. Raven Sinclair’s Pe-kewiwin Project and initiated the ground breaking GIS (Geographic Information System) In Own Words – Mapping the 60s Scoop Diaspora visualising the trafficking and displacement of Indigenous children through Canada’s child welfare policies. SSSN has also collaborated with Dr. Natasha Stirrett and Dr. Jeffrey Monaghan on the Mapping the Sixties Scoop Diaspora, criminalization, and Re-Imagining Indigenous Communities through Storytelling. The Sixties Scoop Network (SSN) continues to be committed to healing, cultural safety and building community with other survivors and Indigenous peoples across Turtle Island
For media inquires, please contact Colleen Cardinal or Elaine Kicknosway at sixtiesscoopmap@gmail.com
Stay tuned for more announcements regarding upcoming events.
Please visit our website for updates, resources and latest news: https://sixtiesscoopnetwork.org/
APRIL 8, 2022
Statement in response to recent announcement of finalization of 60s Scoop Settlement
On behalf of 60s Scoop survivors who have been triggered and/or are feeling unheard and unacknowledged, The Sixties Scoop Network stands in solidarity with you. We hold space for your anger and disappointment following the settlement’s announcement. The Network also wishes to acknowledge the grief and pain felt by 60s Scoop survivors who have been left out of the settlement process altogether.
As Sixties Scoop survivors, our experiences are significant. Many of us had our identities drastically altered while also being displaced from our traditional territories, languages, ceremonies, and kin. The negative impacts of forced assimilation, systemic racism, and intergenerational trauma have reverberated in our lives, families, and communities. Money cannot replace or erase this destruction.
It will take most of us our whole lives to process and heal from what has been done. This process of healing and reclaiming what has been taken, will always be ongoing. But, we are strong and The Sixties Scoop Network will continue to fight for justice and accountability for our stolen childhoods and adolescence.
Indigenous survivors of residential schools, day schools, the 60s Scoop and Millennium Scoop must be part of the national narrative on reconciliation and justice. We deserve to be acknowledged, heard and have our stories and teachings valued. There needs to be more education and awareness about destructive child welfare policies and the relationship to appropriation of Indigenous lands, resources, and wealth for the Federal, Provincial, Territorial and Municipal governments.
Survivors of the 60s Scoop deserve transparency, accountability and an investigation of the Federal government’s collaboration with the provinces to enact and enforce these racism and colonial child welfare policies. We want justice, accountability, reparations,healing and acknowledgment.
The Sixties Scoop Network also wants governments to seek out our forgiveness for what has been done to decimate our family systems, and our communities.We call on Canadians and allies to demand the federal and provincial governments launch a national inquiry into the 60s scoop child removals and forced assimilations.
We acknowledge the resiliency, strength and endurance of survivors who have been patient while reclaiming traditions, rebuilding familial connections to their Nations and reaching out for healing.sSurvivors have been at the grassroots level helping each other heal and care for one another, we will continue to endure.
Sincerely,
Co-founder,
Colleen Hele Cardinal
Elaine Kicknosway
Sixties Scoop Network
Please contact us at:
SIXTIES SCOOP NETWORK SURVIVOR SURVEY
We want to hear from you — Fill out our anonymous survey to let us know what kind of resources you would like help with.
Canada ‘Sixties Scoop’: Indigenous Survivors Map Out Their Stories
Thousands of indigenous children in Canada were forcibly removed from their families between the 1950s and 1980s, in what is known as the “Sixties Scoop”. They were put into non-indigenous homes by welfare agencies, in an attempt to assimilate them into mainstream culture. Now survivors are mapping out their stories and finding solace in connecting with others.
Video by Dan Lytwyn
Please subscribe HERE http://bit.ly/1rbfUog
Giiwe: This is Home
By Merle Robillard
Between 1965 and 1984, Canadian child protection workers removed more than 20,000 Indigenous children from their homes and placed them in foster care or put them up for adoption without the consent of their families or bands. Almost all of these children were placed with white, middle class families and were effectively stripped of their cultural identities. Many bounced from foster home to foster home, ran away and developed addictions in order to cope. Some of these children were treated like slave labour and/or experienced physical, sexual or emotional abuse. The majority developed emotional problems later in life and had difficulty developing a strong sense of identity in either the Euro-Canadian or their Indigenous cultures. Sixty's scoop survivor Brent Mitchell was removed from his home when he was just a year old and moved to New Zealand with his foster parents when he was five where he endured emotional, physical and sexual abuse. Brent Mitchell’s story clearly illustrates the complete lack of sensitivity, respect and consideration to aboriginal children to their culture and family. In the summer of 2017, Brent and his wife, Yolanda traveled from New Zealand to Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he developed a connection with his sister, Penny Carberry and brother, Ron Mitchell as well as with his identity and culture.
In our our Words
Mapping the 60’s Scoop Diaspora
The concept for the project began with the simple idea of using an online GIS mapping platform to visualize the displacements through an interactive map to show Canadians and the world what the 60’s Scoop looks like for survivors who have been displaced from their traditional homelands and territories.
With collaboration from Dr. Raven Sinclair’s Pe-kīwēwin Project, we are excited to announce the launch of this innovative and first of its kind of GIS interactive mapping program as a tool for 60s Scoop survivors to:
1. Visualize the displacements of 60’s Scoop survivors across Canada, U.S and overseas by province and territory.
2. Provide a collective platform to share our stories, videos and photos
3. Provide search functions and a database for survivors and their families still looking for extended families
The Sixties Scoop: the Pay-Off
Posted in: Activism Guide
SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2020 - 14:35
Amnesty International is partnering with the National Indigenous Survivors of Child Welfare Network to raise awareness about the Sixties Scoop. We will be advocating for the continued need to connect survivors who were taken with their families and raising awareness about the ongoing human rights fight, the class action lawsuits and the settlement.
From the late 1950's to the 1980's, many children were adopted not just out of their Indigenous community, or out of province, but some were sent as far away as Germany, Britain, and Australia. The Provincial, Territorial and Canadian governments gravely violated the rights of these families: to belong to their Indigenous nation, to learn their culture and language, to not be subjected to assimilation, and to not be subjected to genocide.
Colleen Hele-Cardinal, cofounder of the Sixties Scoop Network writes,
“I had known that eventually we would receive a settlement and had anticipated that I would be happy and maybe even celebrate the win.
Nothing prepared me for the grief that manifested at a cellular level; my body remembering and reliving decades of physical and emotional pain. It was a reminder of what we, as Sixties Scoop survivors, collectively lost - large extended families, our communities, our languages, ceremonies and the knowledge that comes from ancestors who hunted, fished and thrived since time immemorial on their traditional lands. Without forced adoption, I would have grown up with my family and had the support and safety that comes from being part of a family and community experiencing the same struggle to fit into a society that hated the colour of my skin. I would still endure the ignorance and violence that is the fabric of Canadian culture - racism - but I would have been in my community.
That Saturday morning, I woke up to a slew of messages from other survivors and checked my bank account, anticipating the funds that would be deposited. There it was -- a lump rose from my stomach to my throat. I could not name this feeling at first and then the tentacles of anger and grief crept into my heart, coursed through my veins with every single beat. All-day I felt disconnected and weepy.”
To learn more about the Sixties Scoop and Colleen’s personal reflection on the settlement process, please read the full essay here.
To join survivors and call for the federal government to ask for forgiveness for the child welfare policies that led to the Sixties Scoop please sign the petition.
To learn more about the Sixties Scoop mapping project and explore the diaspora.
Love autobiographies, or looking for a new book suggestion for your book club? Check out Indigenous Rights Advisor, Ana Collins’, Sixties Scoop book recommendations.
Call for Submissions:
We’ve Found Our Voices/We’re Telling Our Stories
The Sixties Scoop has impacted thousands of Indigenous individuals, families and communities. It is an extremely charged issue and I feel that the stories of survivors should be told, so that this assimilationist part of Canadian history does not get swept away and ignored like so many other Indigenous issues.
As a Sixties Scoop survivor and writer/editor, I would like to curate and collect creative non-fiction writing that tells our stories. This would include poetry, prose and short stories.
What I Am Looking For:
I would like stories to be by survivors and/or adoptee Indigenous writers-which means anyone who identifies as First Nation, Inuit, Metis, Status and Non-Status (including those of mixed heritage/ancestry. I also encourage submissions from 2 Spirit/LGBTQIAP folk.
Submissions including Indigenous languages are also welcome, although please include English translations.
The stories can be influenced by your experiences and how the Sixties Scoop impacted you and your families personally, and/or also how it has impacted you currently. Ideas to consider include:
— What was it like for you growing up, knowing that you were adopted? What was your experience like?
— Did you reconnect with your birth family? How did that go?
— Are you looking for family still?
— Where are you in your journey as a survivor?
— Do you have a story of healing
Primarily I would like to see and read stories that not only offer a glimpse into this dark history of Canada, but also offer a sense of hope, strength and resilience.
Submission Details:
Original unpublished work up to 5,000 words, creative non-fiction stories, poetry and prose will be accepted. If you have something that almost fits the criteria and you’re not sure, please submit it anyways. Legible 12-point Times New Roman font. Please list your name, contact info, and word count on the first page.
Call Open From: December 5, 2020 until March 15, 2021
Payment: Will be in Canadian dollars and will be at the discretion of the publisher upon acceptance.
Proceeds: I am hoping that half the proceeds of this anthology will go towards a Native agency that champions and supports our rights and/or advocates for them in a meaningful way that respects our various teachings.
Editor: Christine Miskonoodinkwe Smith
Rights: Upon acceptance, a consent to publish will be sent out. This will also include non-exclusive English World and No re-prints for one year.
Publication Date: TBD by Publisher
Please submit either directly to chrissy.miskonoodinkwesmith@gmail.com or through Google Docs.
Miigwetch
Sixties Scoop Network Video Launch After National Indigenous Peoples Day
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sixties Scoop Network Video Launch After National Indigenous Peoples Day
(Ottawa/Unceded Algonquin Territory – June 22 2023) In celebration of National Indigenous Peoples Day, the Sixties Scoop Network is releasing twelve groundbreaking in-depth video interviews with Sixties Scoop survivors. They will be hosted on the GIS mapping platform, In our own Words: Mapping the Sixties Scoop Diaspora, which visualises the displacement of survivors from their families and nations into non-native adoptive and foster homes across Canada and the globe.
Sixties Scoop Network Director Colleen Hele Cardinal states “The trafficking of Indigenous children through the child welfare policies known as the 60s scoop caused tremendous harm, yet Canada has swept us under the rug without acknowledgement or apology. These videos are only the beginning - we hope these Sixties Scoop survivors’ stories create awareness in the hearts and minds of all Canadians and move them to support us as we heal and strive for justice, recognition and reconciliation.”
The videos are produced by Listuguj Mik’maw filmmaker,konnected.tv co-founder and Canadian Screen Award nominee Steve Martin. In March, the Sixties Scoop Network brought ten international and interprovincial survivors to Ottawa to document their experiences. The project features interviews with Lew Jobs, Sandra Relling and Marni Hope of the Sixties Scoop Indigenous Society of Alberta; award-winning producer Kim Wheeler; Dakota writer and speaker Barbara Bad Elk and her brother Jack Martin; University of Toronto professor Dr. Karyn Recollet, Minneapolis-based Métis activist Jim Rosenau, Dan Milner Atkinson, and Spain-based publisher Daniel Nathan Frost.
Jennifer Podemski, Anishnabe/Ashkenazi, award-winning showrunner and co-creator of Little Bird and founder/CEO of the Shine Network Institute and Red Cloud Studios Inc, states “Having created a TV series about a survivor of the 60’s Scoop and telling that story, I am enraged by how this has been ignored by Canada and Canadians. This campaign is so moving and beautiful and a true testament to survival and Indigenous healing and love.”
In Our Own Words works to reconnect the relations severed by Canada and its provinces, and is a powerful tool for survivors to find family, connect with one another, and have their voices heard on their own terms. The data it generates provides an unprecedented visualisation of how Canada’s colonial child welfare system displaced more than 22,500 Indigenous children from the 1950s to the 1990s. Beginning today, the Sixties Scoop Network will release two videos from the series daily until Tuesday June 27th.
To view the stories: https://sixtiesscoopnetwork.org/; For more information, or media requests please contact: Colleen Hele-Cardinal: sixtiesscoopmap@gmail.com or (343) 558 5113
SIXTIES SCOOP HEALING FOUNDATION 2022 GRANT PROGRAM - CALL FOR APPLICATIONS
SIXTIES SCOOP HEALING FOUNDATION 2022 GRANT PROGRAM - CALL FOR APPLICATIONS
SPRING 2022 NEWS FROM THE CHEIF EXECUTIVE OFFICER Dr. Jacqueline Maurice
Greetings to all 60 Scoop Survivors, Descendants, and Extended Community Members.
2022 Grant Program - Call for Applications
We are proud to announce the 2022 Grant Program roll out approved at the Sixties Scoop Healing Foundation’s March Board Meeting. Led by Pauletta Tremblett, Program Committee Chair, the Grant roll out will build on the 2021 Pilot Grant and will continue to prioritize Indigenous led organizations with charitable status with a focus on building partnerships and collaboration with organizations that serve Sixties Scoop Survivors.
In order to meet the needs of local organizations serving Sixties Scoop Survivors who do not have charitable status, the SSHF has developed an intermediary agreement to allow qualified donees to be able to take on a project as its own activity and engage a non-qualified donee to carry it out. This agreement will need to be signed and submitted with the application form.
Projects funded under the 2022 Grant Program will make direct investments in the health, healing and wellness of Sixties Scoop Survivors, their families, and descendants.
Sign up for the Foundation’s email list to stay up to date on all funding opportunities and Announcements. info@60sscoopfoundation.com
Read more about the 2022 Grant, including eligibility, required materials, and review criteria.2022 Application Guidelines are now available. The deadline to submit your intent to apply by email is May 16, 2022. The deadline to submit your application is May 27th, 2022.
All completed applications and questions directly to: info@grantssixtiesscoophealingfoundation.com
No later than 9:00 PM/21:00 Eastern Time on Friday, May 27, 2022.
SSHF Callout Package 2022 FINAL.pdfSSHF_Grant_Program_Application_Budget_Template_2022.pdfSSHF_Grant_Program_Application_Form_Template_2022.pdf