Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) Analysis in Seven Fallen Feathers

The Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (abbreviated as NNEC), headquartered in Thunder Bay, Ontario, is an Indigenous-run education authority established in 1978. Its core belief that Indigenous people should be able to self-determine the educations of their youth. The NNEC oversees boarding programs, schools, and safety for Indigenous students who attend school off of their reserves.

Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) Quotes in Seven Fallen Feathers

The Seven Fallen Feathers quotes below are all either spoken by Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) or refer to Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC). For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Colonialism, Cultural Genocide, and Racism Theme Icon

At the inquest, […] the lawyer for six of the seven families bluntly stated Robyn's death was no accident—he called it a homicide. […] Homicide, in a coroner's inquest, does not require proof of intention—it is simply the killing of a human being due to the act or omission of another. […] [The lawyer] stated categorically: "We hold NNEC responsible for what happened to Robyn. There is no question the NNEC is trying its best, and there's not a lot of money, but they did have services they held out to be capable and competent and they were neither.""

Related Characters: Tanya Talaga (speaker), Robyn Harper, Cheyenne Linklater, Skye Kakegamic, David Fox

Page Number and Citation: 198-199

Explanation and Analysis:

And yet still the inequities rage. Northern First Nations families are faced with the horrific choice of either sending their children to high school in a community that cannot guarantee their safety, or keeping them at home and hoping distance education will be enough. Families are still being told—more than twenty years after the last residential school was shut down—that they must surrender their children for them to gain an education. Handing over the reins to Indigenous education authorities such as the NNEC without giving them the proper funding tools is another form of colonial control and racism.

Related Characters: Tanya Talaga (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 267

Explanation and Analysis:

Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) Term Timeline in Seven Fallen Feathers

The timeline below shows where the term Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) appears in Seven Fallen Feathers. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Generational Trauma and Circular Suffering Theme Icon

Indigenous Youth, Education Reform, and Support Networks Theme Icon

...in Thunder Bay, a school for Indigenous students run by the Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC). Most of the students who attend DFC come from reserves hundreds of kilometers away and... (full context)

...began to demand a greater say in their children’s educations, the Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) was established to run boarding programs and act as an education authority. (full context)

The NNEC started a distance education program, since dropout rates were still high. Through this initiative, students... (full context)

The old building needed many repairs, and the NNEC needed to find prospective boarding parents in the Thunder Bay area. They wanted to make... (full context)

...Northern Affairs—wasn’t making any progress in addressing the concerns of Canada’s First Nations communities. The NNEC, too, was facing slews of recommendations for how to handle the “profound problems” with the... (full context)

...whole time. So, she insisted that everything was fine and called a counselor from the NNEC. (full context)

David Fox, a counselor from the NNEC, arrived and helped Robyn into his van. Cheyenne Linklater, who was Robyn’s boarding parent and... (full context)

...gotten to a hospital, her case might not have been fatal. The lawyer held the NNEC responsible for Robyn’s death—they had the capacity to help her, but they did not. (full context)

...back to his boarding house, drunk and wet; one of the adult boarders called the NNEC to tell them that Reggie had missed his curfew, and that Rickie was inebriated. But... (full context)

...keep up in school. Reggie, like Robyn, wasn’t cared for or known well by the NNEC members in charge of monitoring him. Cheyenne Linklater, Robyn Harper’s boarding parent, was the one... (full context)

Tradition, Prophecy, Spirituality, and Hope Theme Icon

On October 29, Norma Kejick was at lunch with her NNEC colleague Lydia Big George when she got the call about Reggie’s disappearance. The two of... (full context)

...into Reggie’s death. So did Julian Falconer, on behalf of NAN; and so did the NNEC, the Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth, and INAC. NAN and Rhoda... (full context)

...him that Kyle was still nowhere to be found. Next, Robbie called Norma, now the NNEC director of education. She was devastated that yet another boy was missing. On Wednesday, Robbie... (full context)

...their students to the education system, decades after the closure of the residential schools. The NNEC doesn’t have proper funding or infrastructure—and so putting children in their care, Talaga argues, is... (full context)

...end of the inquest, her marriage had disintegrated, and her husband, who felt that the NNEC was more important to Norma than her own family, had left her. The devastated Norma... (full context)

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Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) Term Analysis

Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) Quotes in Seven Fallen Feathers

Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) Term Timeline in Seven Fallen Feathers

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