Orange Shirt Day part of 'making Canada whole again'

Kim Barrington was on the subway in Toronto last September when a young boy admired the orange shirt that she wore to honor the survivors of Canada's residential schools system.

"It was a little boy, he was maybe 10 years old, who stopped me and said, 'I recognize that orange shirt and I think it's awesome that you're wearing it,'" said Barrington, chair of the Indigenous Peoples' Network at Rogers Communications. "There wasn't a single adult anywhere that acknowledged or recognized what the symbolism behind it meant. And I thought, 'This is something we can do more with.'"
To help observe Orange Shirt Day on Wednesday, Rogers, the broadcast partner of the NHL, raised nearly $100,000 to bring awareness to the history and harmful impact of the shuttered schools on Canada's Indigenous communities through the sale of an orange shirt that the media company commissioned an Ojibwe artist to design.
"The support we have received from our team members and from customers has been overwhelming, a reflection of the hope for Indigenous communities across Canada," Barrington said. "This campaign was a first for us, and it was amazing to see the team come together with passion and a commitment to helping our communities by leveraging the full power of our assets to increase awareness of support for Orange Shirt Day."

The proceeds of Rogers' campaign help support the Orange Shirt Society, which aims to educate Canadians about the residential schools experience and advocate action for reconciliation.
"Sept. 30 is a day we call upon all Canadians to learn about the traumatic legacy of the residential schools, listen to stories from survivors and acknowledge those tragically lost to the system," said Phyllis Webstad, executive director of the Orange Shirt Society, whose personal experience at a residential school inspired Orange Shirt Day. "The support we've seen from our collaborators and from communities coast to coast to support Orange Shirt day is truly meaningful as we continue our healing journey and focus on education as a means to reconciliation."
Rogers' hockey division was a leader in the company's campaign, with on-air talent such as "Hockey Night in Canada" host Ron MacLean and "Rogers Hometown Hockey" co-host Tara Slone promoting the orange T-shirt designed by artist Patrick Hunter.
Rogers has highlighted Canada's Indigenous communities in "Hometown Hockey" broadcasts from the Peguis First Nation in Manitoba in March and the Enoch Cree Nation in Alberta in 2019.
Rogers Sportsnet signed a three-year agreement with the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network last December to broadcast NHL games in Plains Cree. APTN aired games between the Winnipeg Jets and Chicago Blackhawks in Cree on Jan. 19 and Feb. 9.

MacLean said it's important to observe Orange Shirt Day to better understand and learn from an unpleasant chapter in Canada's history.
"It's not soft sympathy," MacLean said. "It's just a true acknowledgement of what took place and a chance to fix it. It's just a really, really important aspect of making Canada whole again."
Beginning in the 1880s, more than 150,000 Indigenous children were separated from their families by the government and sent to church-run residential schools throughout Canada to strip them of their heritage as a way of aggressively assimilating them into white society. Many of the students reported being physically, sexually and psychologically abused at the schools.
"If you were caught speaking your language or doing anything culturally … they would punish you in horrible ways so you would never do it again," Hunter said.
The last residential school closed in 1996. The Canadian government formally apologized for the schools in 2008 and a Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established.

The observance of Orange Shirt Day first began Sept. 30, 2013 and has grown over the years. It stems from the bright shirt that was given to 6-year-old Webstad by her grandmother in 1973 for her first day at a residential school in Williams Lake, British Columbia. School administrators took the shirt from her.
For its orange shirt, Rogers tapped Hunter to create a design that could appeal to all First Nations: 11 feathers that signify the four directions that the residential schools stretched Canada and the Seven Grandfather teachings (love, respect, bravery, truth, honesty, humility and wisdom). Under the feathers are the words, "Every Child Matters."
"Culturally, we believe that the eagle flies the highest and carries the prayers and the goodwill of the people for the creator to hear," Hunter said. "All the eagle feathers are arranged in a sunrise because every single day we have a new opportunity to try to be better than we were the day before."
Canadians can purchase the shirt to support the Orange Shirt Society's educational programming through Oct. 16 at
tsc.ca/wewearorange
.