Espanola High School students were wearing orange as part of a school initiative to recognize the impact of residential schools on First Nation children.
High school teacher, Jayson Stewart says student Nevada Anwhatin (ANN-WHAT-IN) led a memorial song and smudge in the Four Medicines Garden in The CALMmon at the high school as part of the school’s observation of Orange Shirt Day.
He says the day recognizes the 150,000 children who were taken from their homes and forced into residential schools.
Stewart says it is estimated that 4,000 to 6,000 children died while in care.
The orange shirt is just one story, that of Phyllis Webstad who had her bright, new, orange shirt taken away from her when she was taken to a mission school in the early 1970s.