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We acknowledge that EGSA occupies the unceded Indigenous Lands in the territory known today as British Columbia. Unceded means that this land was never surrendered, relinquished or handed over in any way. EGSA acknowledges the true ownership of the lands that ¶¡ÏãÔ°AV’s many campuses stand on. We recognize that the unceded land that we occupy includes not only the ¶¡ÏãÔ°AV Burnaby Campus, but extends to the land occupied by the Vancouver and Surrey campuses of ¶¡ÏãÔ°AV as well.
Based on our current knowledge, this includes the territories of the following First Nations:
- (Burnaby, Vancouver, and Surrey campuses)
- [pronounced Skohomish] (Burnaby, Vancouver, and Surrey campuses)
- [pronounced: slay-wa-tooth] (Burnaby, Vancouver, and Surrey campuses)
- (Burnaby and Surrey campuses)
- (Surrey campus)
- (Surrey campus)
- [pronounced: keh-kite] (Surrey campus)
- (Surrey campus)
- (Surrey campus)
- Please note that as of March 2021, neither the Katzie nor Qayqayt nations have a website
As graduate students, we acknowledge that we each have unique relationships to the land on which we reside and may identify as a settler, uninvited guest, Indigenous to the Land, or other. We encourage individual students to personally situate themselves and continuously reflect on their relation to the .
The EGSA commits to an ongoing and collective (re)visioning process within our organization. Specifically, we would like to acknowledge our indigenizing process as we take up our co-responsibility of enacting the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action and the ¶¡ÏãÔ°AV Aboriginal Reconciliation Council report.
However, due to structures of genocide that target all Indigenous People, and specifically target Indigenous women and girls, trans, and two-spirit people, these lands today are illegally occupied and claimed by British Columbia & Canada. We further recognise that there would be no Faculty of Education at ¶¡ÏãÔ°AV, and indeed no higher education as we know it in Canada without the original and ongoing colonization of Indigenous people and lands, brought on through government policies that were never officially accepted and established together with Indigenous people, just as there would be no Canada. As graduate student educators and future educators, we actively advocate and support the Faculty’s ongoing education initiatives, including our suggestion to create a mandatory course on decolonization in the Canadian and British Columbian context, available to all graduate students in the Faculty of Education.
We want to thank the and for their help in writing this land acknowledgement.
This current land acknowledgement is a living document, making this an ongoing, changing and evolving process. The true path to reconciliation and reparations requires returning these lands, and as EGSA students, we are committed to standing in solidarity with, and actively supporting, Indigenous peoples in the fight for land recognition and reparation.
THE EGSA
The EGSA is run by members of the education graduate student community and provides a number of services to support education graduate students. The EGSA also provides student representation to the faculty, advocating for student needs and concerns. We meet once a month and all education graduate students are welcome!
EGSA 2022-2023 EXECUTIVE TEAM
Learn more about our monthly meetings, events, socials and more! Upcoming Event:
EdGSA GENERAL MEETING
- Feb 13, Monday, 2pm to 3:30pm
- EDB 8501 or via
Learn more about funds to help grad students cover the cost of attending conferences and of professional development opportunities.
Learn more about professional development opportunities including our very own journal the ¶¡ÏãÔ°AV EdReview and Learning Together Conference.
Looking for forms, links to important sites, or information on student life? Check out our resources page.