Delivering education to the community: North Bay training college eases opportunities for Indigenous learners.

• Author: Kelly, Lindsay
• Position: NORTH BABY

It was 1990 when Metis educator Larry Stewart first noticed a "huge training gap" amongst residents in remote Indigenous communities.

Determined to address the issue, Stewart travelled to the Cree community of Weenusk (Peawanuk) First Nation to offer heavy equipment operator training to 10 participants. Word spread amongst the coastal communities and, before long, he was travelling up and down the Hudson Bay coast, training residents as he went.

"We would provide the training materials and the instructor, and then we would do a heavy equipment operator's program in the community and go from there," Stewart said. "From that point, we basically expanded into other trades and technologies, and now we have a fivefold training strategy-"

Today, Stewart and his staff of 13 offer training from the Native Education & Training College of Business, Healthcare, Human Service & Technology (NETC), a 10,000-square-foot facility located in downtown North Bay.

NETC was the first registered and approved private, Indigenous-led career training college in Ontario, and it remains independent. NETC is a member of the Contact North network.

The college offers a range of courses through five different schools: health sciences, human and community services, trades and technology, business, and management. The curricula, which is all developed in-house, caters to First Nations communities, along with tribal councils, friendship centres, and other Indigenous organizations.

Despite the nationwide need for skilled tradespeople, Stewart said trades programs like general carpentry and plumbing techniques have fallen out of favour with students. NETC's most popular courses are in the health sciences field: personal support worker, addictions worker, medical administrative assistant, among others.

Stewart said that's a direct reflection of the growing need, in many Indigenous communities, for health care personnel.

"Trades training is not that popular any longer," he said. "There is a shortage (of skilled trades workers), but there's not really that much interest in it."

Most of NETC's programming is now offered online, Stewart said, although courses such as early childcare assistant and personal support worker are hosted on campus, because they require students to complete a placement...