English CEGEPs ask Quebec government to expand Bill 96 exemptions for Indigenous students

The directors of five English CEGEPs say exemptions to Bill 96 made by the Quebec government for Indigenous students are insufficient, inaccessible and that the law is causing students to leave the province for their higher education.

In an open letter penned to Premier François Legault on Wednesday, the directors said the adoption of Bill 96, now Law 14, is making it more difficult for Indigenous students to learn their ancestral languages.

The law overhauling the Charter of the French Language will soon require students at the province's English junior colleges to take three core courses in French or to take a total of five second-language French courses instead of the current two.

Those provisions, the directors wrote, "are creating multiple systemic and discriminatory barriers" to the roughly 300 Indigenous students studying at their schools.

"We therefore urge the Government of Quebec to consider the gravity of the situation and to commit posthaste to a constructive dialogue with Indigenous communities," they said.

Indigenous students and leaders have for two years decried the additional barriers they say the law's higher-education requirements would create for students already facing hardships, including having to study far from home and often in their second language, English.

Last spring, after two First Nations groups requested a judicial review of a number of the law's articles, the government committed to exempting some Indigenous students from taking the French exit exam.

The exemption is not enshrined in the law and could therefore be repealed at any time. To be eligible, Indigenous students must meet a list of requirements and fill in a six-page form many have called invasive and a callback to colonial times.

To qualify, students — in addition to having a status card and be studying at an English CEGEP — must live or have lived on a reserve and have studied English or an Indigenous language for at least one year of elementary or high school.

"More than two years after the passing of Bill 96, the measures taken by the Ministry of Higher Education remain insufficient," the directors said in the letter.

Tiawenti:non Canadian, co-ordinator of the First Peoples' Centre at Dawson College, says Bill 96, and the requirement for English CEGEP students to take more classes in French, would have a negative effect on the morale of Indigenous students. (Dave St-Amant/CBC)

Tiawenti:non Canadian, the co-ordinator of the First Peoples' Centre at Dawson College, said the open letter is a result of advocacy by students who were not feeling heard.

"I'm very uncomfortable with the idea that students who are Indigenous, who have status, are being denied this exemption to learn in the language of their choice. It does not sit well with me that you're potentially creating two groups of Indigenous students," Canadian said in an interview Tuesday ahead of the letter's publication.

The exemption, in most cases, only covers the exam itself — meaning students would still have to take the extra French course.

"Failures take a heavy toll on students' emotional and mental well-being. These are super intelligent kids, but French is often their third language," she said.

Difficult transition

Canadian said she already knows of at least 10 Indigenous students who chose to study in Ontario or the United States in recent years to avoid mandatory French courses.

"In that case, those students leave their parents' homes early. They're expected to be more independent. And it's a difficult transition, especially in their late teens," she said.

Canadian said she herself had struggled in CEGEP at Vanier College, one of the five English schools who signed the open letter, because of French requirements, leading her to start university at 21 as an independent student before qualifying for an undergraduate degree.

In the meantime, she attended the two-year Kanien'kéha Ratiwennahní:rats Adult Immersion Program in Kahnawà:ke, where she says she gained a stronger assurance in herself and her language.

Canadian is from Kahnawà:ke and studied at the Kahnawà:ke Survival, a high school created in 1978 after Kanien'kehá:ka students walked out of their previous school in protest of Bill 101.

"It's this cultural push. We do need to protect Kanien'kéha, we do need to speak it. It's always gonna be so much more important to our identity," Canadian said. "French is imposed."

'It felt like a personal attack'

Angela Ottereyes, 40, is one of the students who met with Dawson administrators, asking the school to call on the Quebec government to exempt Indigenous students at English CEGEPs from provisions of a new language law coming into effect in the fall.

Ottereyes has been studying law, society and justice at Dawson College since the fall of 2021 in the hopes of pursuing university studies in law or First Peoples.

This year, after becoming more involved and outspoken on social issues, Ottereyes was hoping to switch into the CEGEP's new Social Change and Solidarity program.

Ottereyes, 40, is from Waskaganish, a Cree nation at the bottom tip of James Bay in Northern Quebec, has six children, and survived cancer during the pandemic.

When she learned Bill 96 would disproportionately affect Indigenous students at English CEGEPs, she began speaking with her peers about their struggles balancing the survival of their ancestral languages while having to learn French.

"It just felt like a personal attack on my identity as an Indigenous person, like telling you that in order for you to get a college diploma you have to learn this colonial language," she said.

She decided not to change programs in order to avoid being affected by the law. But is now turning to the effects it will have on her children. Two of them, twins, are due to graduate high school next year.

She said they will either go to school in Ontario or try to muscle their way through the extra French courses. Both options are far from ideal, Ottereyes added.