What Chanie Wenjack's sister wants from Gord Downie's Secret Path

Fifty years after Chanie Wenjack's tragic death while running away from residential school, his sister says it's time every First Nation had its own school.

The story of the 12-year-old boy who froze to death beside the railway tracks while trying to walk 600 kilometres home is getting a very public retelling through Gord Downie's multi-media project, Secret Path.

For his sister, Pearl (Wenjack) Achneepineskum, it's a new opportunity to fulfila promise she made the day her little brother's body arrived home from residential school in a coffin.

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"I swore that I would do something about it the day he died.I would not have my brother's death swept undera rug,"Achneepineskumsaid.

But decades went by, and it felt likeChanie'sdeath was being ignored.

An inquest into hisdeath one of the first inquiries into residential school deaths was held inKenora, Ont. in November 1966.Among its handwritten recommendations is that"a study be made of the present Indian education and philosophy. Is it right?"

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An echo of that question can be heard in recommendations from a 2016inquest into seven First Nations high school studentswho died while attending school in Thunder Bay, Ont., between 2000 and 2011.

Among the 145 recommendations for preventing the deaths of other students, the jury said thatall First Nations should havehighschools of their own.

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The students who died had traveled to the city from remote First Nations in northern Ontario, because, likeWenjack'shome at Marten Falls First Nation,there are no high schools on their reserves.

Three of the deaths were ruled accidental, while the causes of four others remainundetermined.

'Native children matter'

"I'm very much concerned about the children going to high schools and losing their lives," said Achneepineskum, agrandmother to dozens of school-aged grandchildren."Everytime a child loses his life or her life, I walk through the same path and I remember the fear and the unhappiness of going, and wanting to get home."

Through Downie's work, Achneepineskumsays shehopes Canadians will come to realize that "Native children matter."

Building high schools in all First Nations would demonstrate that, said the 68-year-old.

Only then will First Nationschildren and teens be able "tostay home, be content, be happy, like everybody else's children. That's what I was hoping to get from this.If Charlie's life can save other children then I've done my work," saidAchneepineskum.

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