To make the Land Acknowledgment more accessible to students and staff across York Region District School Board, students are helping to create Land Acknowledgment videos in multiple languages including English, French and American Sign Language.
"I feel really excited to be the person to do the Land Acknowledgement. It's important that people who use American Sign Language and are deaf can understand and have access to the Land Acknowledgement," said Gavin, a Grade 10 student at Alexander Mackenzie H.S. "It's important to respect Indigenous people and their communities and work together."
"As a teacher of the deaf and hard of hearing, I saw that our students who were deaf need ASL, that access to our Land Acknowledgment, so I thought it was really important to be able to film that in their language," said Jana Girdauskas, Deaf and Hard of Hearing Specialist Teacher.
"I think what educators show know when they're reading the Land Acknowledgement, or hearing the Land Acknowledgment, is that as we partner with local communities, as we work together toward the ultimate goal, we are recognizing the land, but we are also making a commitment to some of those priorities within the Land Acknowledgement," said Kyle Herbert, First Nation, Métis and Inuit Education Consultant.
The Land Acknowledgment videos will be available to schools by the fall.