The recommendations of the Minister's National Working Group on Education are meant to help set up a high-quality First Nations education system, based on indigenous knowledge, so that students have the necessary knowledge and skills to participate fully in First Nations communities and in Canadian society.

In order to foster excellence in First Nations education, the Minister's National Working Group on Education was set up in June 2002. The working group was made up of 15 Aboriginal educators from across Canada. The working group reviewed the existing research and did a rigorous analysis of the following key topics related to First Nations education:

• infrastructure and funding;
• teacher recruitment and retention;
• jurisdiction;
• racism;
• indigenous knowledge;
• language and culture in curriculum;
• special needs and gifted education;
• early childhood education; and
• parental and community involvement.

On February 12, 2003, the final report of the working group, called Our Children - Keepers of the Sacred Knowledge was publicly released. The report included 27 recommendations that, in keeping with the holistic First Nations philosophy of lifelong learning, span early childhood to post-secondary education.

Departmental officials are currently working with First Nations to target the key issues highlighted in the working group's report and previous research such as teacher recruitment and retention, parental and community involvement, and meeting the special education needs of students.

After the release of the final report, more funding was allocated for teacher recruitment. This included $8 million in 2003-2004 and $15 million in 2004-2005 to help narrow the gap between on reserve and provincial teachers' salaries. More funding, totalling $2 million in 2003-2004 and $5 million in 2004-2005, has also been allocated for pilot projects to support and build upon existing community initiatives to increase parental/ community involvement and also in 2004-2005, $5 million to enhance professional development activities for teachers.

For more information on this topic, you can read the working group's report on the INAC website.

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