How Canada says it can improve First Nations education after 7 students died in Thunder Bay, Ont.

The jury at the inquest into the deaths of seven First Nations students in Thunder Bay, Ont., will deliver its recommendations on Tuesday for improving Indigenous education.

The inquest is examining the circumstances surrounding the deaths, between 2000 and 2011, of young people from remote First Nations who came to Thunder Bay to attend high school. Most of their communities have little in the way of secondary education.

Lawyers for the 11 parties represented at the inquest submitted a joint slate of 118 suggested recommendations to the jury last month, including creating high schools in all First Nations communities so teens wouldn't have to leave their families and homes to get an education.

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The federal government took no position on those recommendations and made none of its own.

Canada ready to 'transform programs'

Canada is ready "for immediate engagement with First Nations to review and transform programs," said Gregory Tzemenakis, the lawyer representing the federal department of Indigenous Affairs at the inquest.

But he asked jurors to be cautious in making "blanket recommendations" when he said they have not heard any direct evidence from individual First Nations about their priorities for education.

"Blanket recommendations without direct input from First Nations may not achieve the results we are looking for," Tzemenakis said.

According to Tzemenakis, these are the recommendations Canada would consider implementing:

• 1. Improving the First Nations education funding formula
• 2. Eliminating the need for First Nations to write proposals to receive funding for predictable, on-going education needs
• 3. Providing operation and maintenance funding for Dennis Franklin Cromarty First Nations high school. Current federal government policy prevents that because the school is located in Thunder Bay and not on a reserve
• 4. Increasing funding for education on First Nations reserves
• 5. Increasing funding for travel so that First Nations students attending school away from home could return to their communities more than once during the school year
• 6. Providing funding for orientation trips so that students who must leave home to attend high school can visit the city and school they will be attending before the school year starts
• 7. Working with First Nations to "close and hopefully eliminate" the education achievement gap
• 8. Increasing the amount of money Canada provides per First Nations student attending a school off reserve

In the spring budget, the Liberals promised to spend $2.6 billion dollars over the next five years for primary and secondary schooling on reserves. 

The inquest is scheduled to resume at 10 a.m. on Tuesday when the jury will render a verdict for each of the seven deaths and issue its recommendations.

The proceedings take place at the Thunder Bay court house and are open to the public.