Overrepresentation Indigenous Youth

As previously illustrated, the unprecedented overrepresentation of Indigenous youth in the Manitoba Child Welfare System has been a prominent social problem since the beginning of the decline in residential schools in the 1950’s. Understandably, the transgenerational removal and transferring of their children has had a lasting impact on the province’s Indigenous population. Notably, “the consequences of successive assimilation schemes, exacerbated by inequitable funding for [..] social services to First Nations people, have been devastating to Indigenous populations in Canada, resulting in a legacy of social chaos that is evident in cities and First Nation communities” (Sinclair, 2016). Rather than “producing healthy First Nations citizens

Moreover, when an Indigenous child grows up in non-Indigenous care, oftentimes, the only cultural education that they receive is formal education. Unfortunately, the education system can contribute to fostering mental health concerns by focusing on the colonial aspects of Indigenous history, “legitimating [the] ideology of colonialism” (Gebhard, 2017) for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth. Educators reveal that, in their daily encounters with non-Indigenous society, Indigenous youth “deal with low expectations, and incidents of outright racism” (Gebhard, 2017). Furthermore, the disproportionately high rates of Indigenous youth in non-Indigenous care coupled with this coinciding lack of Indigenous cultural identity acts as a pipeline to many additional social problems, such as, increased rates of suicide, criminal activity, various types of abuse, and other severe consequences. It is noted that, “the majority of children and youth involved with child welfare in Manitoba are exhibiting known risk factors for suicide” (“Special Reports.” Office of the Children’s Advocate Manitoba). For instance,

In the area of criminal justice, 68% of youth who died by suicide were involved with justice as compared to 33% of youth in the control group. And while 26% of youth in the control group expressed a desire to die, 64% of youth who eventually died had previously talked about it to child welfare professionals (“Special Reports.” Office of the Children’s Advocate Manitoba).

Evidently, “the child protection model employed by Manitoba is problematic with the Children’s Advocate suggesting that the system is in a ‘state of chaos’” MacDonald, Levasseur, 2014). Indigenous children who grow up in the child welfare system are significantly disadvantaged in several key aspects of life which hinders their ability to become functioning members of Indigenous communities and larger society in