When most people think about the required courses they will take in college, they think about courses specific to their major and therefore their interests. While few people have a specific interest in Indigenous studies, the idea of a mandatory course for all has been raised many times in the past, and in his article "Why Indigenous Studies Shouldn't Be Mandatory," Josh Dehaas passionately argues his arguments against . Start by first introducing both sides of the issue. Julianne Beaudin-Herney is a student attending First Nations University who started a petition to introduce mandatory Indigenous studies classes at the University of Regina, where she witnessed the blatant stereotyping of her people as "Indian princesses" at a school party (Dehaas par. 19). .Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essayDehaas finds Beaudin-Herney opponents in engineering students at the University of Regina. Many non-Indigenous students believe that the topic is already covered in depth in each year before high school graduation (Dehaas para. 13). By focusing exclusively on engineering students and giving little voice to Beaudin-Herney, Dehaas ignores or trivializes why these courses are integral to building bridges between different cultures in Canada. Dehaas focuses much of the first half of his essay on the difficulty that an additional required course would pose for engineering students. To obtain an engineering degree, students must first complete 45 classes and are often overwhelmed, so fewer than 64% meet the requirements to graduate within 6 years (Dehaas par. 4); much less finish in the standard 4 to 5. Of those 45 classes they can only select one elective in the humanities, many are opposed to that single course becoming a requirement for Indigenous Studies. It is important to note that Indigenous Studies is not currently on the list of humanities elective courses. Dehaas provides a list of what they can choose from: women's studies, English, philosophy, or religion (para. 5). The only student mentioned by name, Kyle Smyth, openly states that he is not willing to give up his already chosen English elective course and is not willing to increase the course load which would bring the total required lessons to 46. Another argument that Smyth makes counter simple addition the lesson is that he and his classmates are not willing to spend $650 and “countless” hours for a course they didn't ask for (Dehaas par. 6). At this point it should be said that assuming the University of Regina has a standard 3 hours of instruction per week for a single semester class, Smyth and his friends would only spend 36 hours at most on Indigenous studies material. The second half of the essay is a series of statements that explain her already deep understanding of Indigenous issues and asserts that from kindergarten through graduate school general Canadian history was set aside to accommodate Indigenous and non-Indigenous relationships. By his own admission In fourth grade [he] compiled maps detailing the different Aboriginal language groups, in fifth grade [he] made bannock with Algonquin grandmothers, and in fifth grade [he] listened intently to a Cree woman [speak ] of how she was flown in from Hudson's Bay each fall within the Timmins residential schools (Dehaas par. 14) and while these offer an important understanding of relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous, teachers can only expect 2018.
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