This article was written by Connor Maffey as part of the Student Journalism Program at St. Thomas Aquinas High School.
Communities across Canada wore orange shirts this week, to promote awareness for the harmful impact the Indian residential school system had on Indigenous communities.
Why an orange shirt? The orange shirt represents a six year old girl named Phyllis Webstad who had a brand new orange shirt given to her by her grandmother, and it was taken away at St. Joseph Mission Residential School in 1973.
Elder Isobel White from Whitefish Bay explains why Orange Shirt Day is such an important event.
"Residential schools is where the Anishinaabe children were sent to go to school. They didn't have any schools on their First Nation communities. They had to go far far away to go to school, and some of them didn't come back home at all, because their parents couldn't pick them up," she said.
"This was very hard, and very lonely for them. I can put myself in their shoes as a little girl, and how I would feel if I didn't have the love, and affection from my parents on a daily basis."
St. Thomas Aquinas High School had lots of students participating in the event filling the halls with orange. One of the students from the school Liam George, talks about why orange shirt day is important to him.
"It's important to me because it's a part of my community," he said. "It's a part of the culture, and it makes me who I am today."
George added that the residential school system has affected a lot of people in his life, including his parents, and that Orange Shirt Day is a good way to help spread awareness about the impact residential schools had and continues to have to this day.
For more information on Orange Shirt Day you can visit https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/what-is-orange-shirt-day.