"Without immediate, robust, and heartfelt intervention, language decline will be irreversible." - Chelsea Vowel

Our Work: A short film of Haisla Community Lead Language Revitalization

One of the most devastating multi-generational impacts of the residential school system has been the loss of indigenous languages. The language carries so much of the community history, cultural traditions and spiritual beliefs, so this loss of language has also contributed to an overall decline in practicing and sharing traditional customs and beliefs.

The loss of self-identity and self-esteem that results from not knowing and practicing traditional language and cultural traditions has led to multi-generational social pathologies including low basic literacy and numeracy skills; high rates of elementary and secondary school dropouts; anti-social and risky behaviours; and alcohol and drug abuse.

The First Nations Education Foundation collaborates with First Nation governments to develop language revitalization programs for at-risk indigenous dialects using contemporary educational practices and innovative, interactive technology.

In the summer of 2020 FNEF introduced the Rapid Word Collection (RWC) methodology of language curation and corpus building to the Haisla language community and British Columbia in general.  The project was the first to employ the RWC method in BC (and all of Canada as far as it can be determined) and the results were very encouraging for use in other communities looking for support in their language efforts and goals.

In August 2020 when the RWC workshop began there were roughly 300 Haislakala words archived. Within 8 weeks, this project produced 12,240 entries and 5,400 audio files and generated an updated digital keyboard coded in the correct orthography.

The content collected forms the base for curriculum and lesson development and delivery in community school language and culture programs.

Rapid Word Collection is a methodology that directly addresses the "aging demographic" issue where the last fluent Elder speakers and knowledge keepers are passing away - taking their knowledge with them.

First Nations Education Foundation seeks to make RWC programing available to all First Nations communities seeking language revitalization support.