DWF LIVE with Tom Wilson

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Join @DownieWenjack on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube live at 1:30pm EDT as we chat with Tom Wilson.

DWF LIVE connects viewers to Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists to build awareness, education, and connection. These sessions inspire us all to answer Gord Downie’s call to “Do Something”, even during times of isolation, to make Canada a better place for Indigenous peoples.

These 30 – 60-minute online sessions are open to all ages through DWF’s social media accounts @DownieWenjack. The DWF LIVE sessions also work to help support artists during these difficult times.

DWF LIVE with Rob Ferreira

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Join @DownieWenjack on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube live at 2pm EDT as we chat with Rob Ferreira, co-founder of Walk for Wenjack.

DWF LIVE connects viewers to Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists to build awareness, education, and connection. These sessions inspire us all to answer Gord Downie’s call to “Do Something”, even during times of isolation, to make Canada a better place for Indigenous peoples.

These 30 – 60-minute online sessions are open to all ages through DWF’s social media accounts @DownieWenjack. The DWF LIVE sessions also work to help support artists during these difficult times.

Orange Shirt Day Event: On the path to reconciliation

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Featuring Mike Downie, award-winning documentary filmmaker and co-founder of the Gord Downie & Chanie Wenjack fund, plus special musical guest, William Prince. 

Let’s come together in the spirit of reconciliation and hope on Orange Shirt Day!

This event will inspire and entertain you. Join us live and IG Wealth Management will make a $20 donation* on your behalf to the Gord Downie & Chanie Wenjack Fund.

Register now – https://event.on24.com/wcc/r/2620192/97BBEAA890119666B535B8F606AD245C

Why attend?

– Hear how Mike and his brother, Gord Downie, started the Secret Path project to tell the story of Chanie Wenjack.

– Enjoy music by Juno Award-winning artist, William Prince from the Peguis First Nation

– Discover what Mike thinks Canadians like you can do to become an ally for people affected by residential schools 

*IG Wealth Management will donate $20 per live event attendee to the Gord Downie & Chanie Wenjack Fund, up to a maximum donation of $40,000.

Speakers
Mike Downie
Mike Downie
Award-winning documentary filmmaker and the co-founder of the Gord Downie & Chanie Wenjack Fund

A celebrated and inspirational storyteller, Downie takes his audiences on a ride that explores how our stories define us, remind us of our past, and shape our future, both as individuals and as a nation.

One story in particular has been life-changing for Downie — Chanie Wenjack, an Ojibway boy who died while running away from his residential school. Downie told the tragic tale to his brother Gord and the two vowed to find a way to share this story with the world.

Before his career in film and television, Downie worked as a deep shaft miner in Northern Ontario; a medical researcher at McGill University; a junior economist in Toronto; and as a windsurfing instructor in the US Virgin Islands. He holds a Bachelor of Science with Honours from Queen’s University, and an MBA from York University’s Schulich School of Business.

“Gord and I spent our lives learning, again and again, the power in a story, everyone’s story.”

William Prince
William Prince
Canadian Juno award-winning country-folk Singer/Songwriter

William Prince rose to national attention when his debut alburm, Earthly Days, won the Juno Award for Contemporary Roots Album of the Year in 2017.

A member of the Peguis First Nation near Winnipeg, Manitoba, Prince is also a part-time member of the indigenous rock group, Indian City, with whom he recorded and performed prior to his solo success. Prince counts Chief Peguis as a direct ancestor. His father was a preacher and a musician, and many of his first musical experiences are rooted in playing alongside his father in church.

Walk For Wenjack

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We encourage you to walk for Chanie Wenjack and his family on October 22, the day Chanie succumbed to the elements as he was trying to get home. Walks can also be organized on other dates during Secret Path Week (Oct. 17-22).

Start planning your Walk today! For more information and to register, click here.

DWF LIVE with ShoShona of Digging Roots

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Join @DownieWenjack on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube live at 2pm EDT as we chat with ShoShona of Digging Roots.

DWF LIVE connects viewers to Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists to build awareness, education, and connection. These sessions inspire us all to answer Gord Downie’s call to “Do Something”, even during times of isolation, to make Canada a better place for Indigenous peoples.

These 30 – 60-minute online sessions are open to all ages through DWF’s social media accounts @DownieWenjack. The DWF LIVE sessions also work to help support artists during these difficult times.

Carol Hermiston – Exploring By The Seat Of Your Pants

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Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants is an organization which knocks down classroom walls and take students anywhere in the world, never having to leave their desks. It aims to inspire the next generation of students by bringing science, exploration, adventure, and conservation into classrooms through virtual speakers and field trips with leading experts across the globe.

For Secret Path Week, Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants will be focusing on Indigenous education featuring Indigenous scientists, explorers, artists, activists, and speakers.  This will be a valuable way to engage your class in reconciliation and encourage your students to “Do Something”!

Join Carol as she shares her grandmother’s story of Residential School and how she envisions Reconciliation.

Carol is an Ojibway elder from Batchewana First Nation in Northern Ontario where she lives with her husband. She has two children, a son and a daughter, and also three beautiful grandchildren. She returned to school when she was forty years old to obtain her grade 12, and with the support and encouragement of family and friends has continued on and graduated as a Registered Nurse in 1995 from Sault College. Carol went on to work in First Nation Health as a Community Health Nurse for 22 years and during that time she became a Certified Mental Health Nurse. Carol retired three years ago. Since then, she has attended Algoma University and graduated this past May with a BA in Anishinaabe Studies. Carol enjoys reading, attending Pow Wows, and also spending time with her family.

Monique Aura – Exploring By The Seat Of Your Pants

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Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants is an organization which knocks down classroom walls and take students anywhere in the world, never having to leave their desks. It aims to inspire the next generation of students by bringing science, exploration, adventure, and conservation into classrooms through virtual speakers and field trips with leading experts across the globe.

For Secret Path Week, Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants will be focusing on Indigenous education featuring Indigenous scientists, explorers, artists, activists, and speakers.  This will be a valuable way to engage your class in reconciliation and encourage your students to “Do Something”!

Monique Aura Bedard (they/them) is a neurodiverse Onyota’a:ka x French art-maker x visual storyteller who is currently based on Dish with One Spoon Territory (Tkaronto). They grew up on Anishinaabe aki, downriver from Aamjiwnaang First Nation.

Through their art practice (sewing, beading, painting murals, journaling), they aim to express and share stories about intergenerational healing, mind health, identity, empowerment, and authenticity. They are inspired by stories, memory, community and growth, individually and collectively. Monique Aura aims to address intergenerational healing in their family by trusting the creative process. The core of their work is about moving through the world with love and fierceness. Their art is their voice, their truth and an extension of who they are. Aura’s hope is that their art reaches others in a way that inspires thoughts and feelings igniting questions, curiosity, reflection and self-love.

Leela Gilday – Exploring By The Seat Of Your Pants

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Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants is an organization which knocks down classroom walls and take students anywhere in the world, never having to leave their desks. It aims to inspire the next generation of students by bringing science, exploration, adventure, and conservation into classrooms through virtual speakers and field trips with leading experts across the globe.

For Secret Path Week, Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants will be focusing on Indigenous education featuring Indigenous scientists, explorers, artists, activists, and speakers.  This will be a valuable way to engage your class in reconciliation and encourage your students to “Do Something”!

If you’re from the North, Leela Gilday’s music is home. If you’ve never been, it will take you there. Born and raised in the Northwest Territories, she writes about the people and the land that created her. The power in her voice conveys the depth of her feelings of love and life in a rugged environment and vibrant culture, as if it comes straight from that earth. Leela’s family is from Délįne on the shore of Great Bear Lake, and her rich vocals dance across the rhythmic beats of traditional Dene drumming as smoothly as a bass line onstage the largest venues in the country. And she has played them all.

G.R. Gritt – Exploring By The Seat Of Your Pants

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Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants is an organization which knocks down classroom walls and take students anywhere in the world, never having to leave their desks. It aims to inspire the next generation of students by bringing science, exploration, adventure, and conservation into classrooms through virtual speakers and field trips with leading experts across the globe.

For Secret Path Week, Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants will be focusing on Indigenous education featuring Indigenous scientists, explorers, artists, activists, and speakers.  This will be a valuable way to engage your class in reconciliation and encourage your students to “Do Something”!

G.R. Gritt is a Juno Award-winning, Two-Spirit, Transgender, Francophone, Anishinaabe/Métis artist. After living many years in Yellowknife and forming the band Quantum Tangle, they have recently moved back to Sudbury/Robinson Huron Treaty territory where they grew up. This homecoming coincides with a journey that they feel better represents them. With these changes has come a new voice both physically and in the growing magnetism of their songwriting. G.R. Gritt pulls effortlessly from the past to create soulful futurisms with their new sound that elegantly weaves the melodies using vocals, guitar, and new electronic elements. They create both intimate and anthemic music that would fit in a folk club, a dance club, and anywhere in between. G.R. Gritt is currently preparing for the release of a new full-length album titled, Ancestors, in 2020 on Coax Records.

Megan Lortie – Exploring By The Seat Of Your Pants

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Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants is an organization which knocks down classroom walls and take students anywhere in the world, never having to leave their desks. It aims to inspire the next generation of students by bringing science, exploration, adventure, and conservation into classrooms through virtual speakers and field trips with leading experts across the globe.

For Secret Path Week, Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants will be focusing on Indigenous education featuring Indigenous scientists, explorers, artists, activists, and speakers.  This will be a valuable way to engage your class in reconciliation and encourage your students to “Do Something”!

Meagan Lortie is an non-status Anishinaabe Kwe from Barrie, Ontario. Currently, she is on her own journey of exploring her culture and ancestry. From very young she has been volunteering and working with the Urban Indigenous community and is passionate about reconciliation and decolonization. In her presentation, Meagan will explore what reconciliation looks like and how people can begin/ continue their own reconciliation/ decolonization journey by sharing her experiences while coordinating the Jane Goodall Institute of Canada’s Uncovering Common Ground (UCG) Initiative. Meagan will talk about the UCG initiative, share some examples of reconciliation projects and explore some ideas of how people can get involved in their own community.