A First Nations dream soured

High hopes wafted in the air along with the scent of burnt sweetgrass that day in June 2003 when the First Nations University of Canada opened its doors. The new Regina campus was a vision: a curvaceous $30-million, 14,000 square-foot spread of concrete and green glass designed by celebrated aboriginal architect Douglas Cardinal.

Resembling an eagle, wings outstretched, it symbolizes the broadened perspective of higher learning.

Prince Edward had come to anoint the first Canadian university run by, and for, aboriginals. This was, he said, "a great milestone" in the relationship between Canada, the Crown, and the country's first people.

"It was a dream of our elders and previous leaders to see this," proclaimed Perry Bellegarde, chief of the Federation of Saskatchewan of Indian Nations. The school would fulfill their aspiration of First Nations controlling their own educational destinies. "It just brings joy to people's hearts and almost tears to our eyes," he said.

Today, that dream is in tatters. Recently, the Saskatchewan and federal governments announced they will no longer fund the university, obliterating half its budget. Enrolment is barely half what it was in 2005; dozens of faculty have quit or been fired in recent years. Accusations of embezzlement and corruption have been rampant; one former executive is awaiting trial on criminal charges.

The campus is paralyzed with paranoia: Staff are warned against talking to the media and former faculty claim they were fired for speaking out. The school's board of directors dissolved this month. Seven years after it opened, it is uncertain First Nations University will last until fall, let alone achieve the hopes of seven years ago.

"I saw the exodus of some of the brightest, best young academic minds leave that institution," says Wes Stevenson, the university's former vice-president academic. "It's sad. I don't know if it'll ever rebound."

Many former staff, including Mr. Stevenson, blame the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations (FSIN), the powerful union of the province's 74 bands. The federation runs native casinos, lends money to aboriginal businesses and runs post-secondary schools, including the Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technologies and First Nations University.

The Saskatchewan federation fathered this school, establishing in 1976 its predecessor, the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College, as part of the University of Regina. Yet the seeds of turmoil may have been the school's creation -- as the official property of FSIN. The federation's control has undoubtedly been at the root of its troubles. FSIN chief, Guy Lonechild, did not respond to interview requests.

"It's a bit foreign to them that there are things they can't be sticking their nose into," says a former senior official at the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs who worked in the ministry when the university was christened. "They don't get the importance of academic independence. They were told over and over to get their governance straightened out. They just refused."

Compared to the other two universities in Saskatchewan, the First Nation University's board was massive (28 members compared to University of Regina's 11) and filled with chiefs and band councillors without experience in university governance. Yet they were well compensated: FNUC spent roughly $11,000 every meeting on their honorariums and travel allowances (the University of Saskatchewan's directors are volunteers). Also, the university paid the

FSIN an annual $125,000 "management fee," to promote its interests.

It was a "politicized board," says James Turk, executive director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers. It was too large, and too political, he says, to permit the necessary academic independence and freedom. Last year, CAUT censured the university, the first time it has invoked such a move since the early 1980s. It advised not to take jobs there and to avoid attending or holding conferences there.

"FNUC was on the cusp on international stardom," Mr. Bellegarde says today. "If we keep talking about self-determination and self-government, part of that is institutional building. And [First Nations University] was part of those institutions. The chiefs started it, but then you release and let it go, and develop and flourish on its own."

Trouble is, the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations wasn't shy about imposing its will. In February 2005, the federation's vice-chief, Morley Watson, chairman of the university's board -- under authority from FSIN chief Alphonse Bird -- fired several senior staffers, replacing them with handpicked candidates, including some relatives. He later dismissed the deans of the school's satellite campuses.

He claimed there were financial irregularities afoot. Later he said it was questionable spending by Mr. Stevenson, who had been with the school since 1993 -- something about two laptop purchases and a trip to Scotland, totalling about $10,000. The allegations, which have not been proven, had come from Mr. Stevenson's brother. The RCMP laid charges. Mr. Stevenson says he's sure they will soon be dropped.

The real motive, he believes, was that the federation saw the school's success as an opportunity to cash in. "They thought it was richer than it really was." Mr. Watson launched similar accusations of impropriety in 1998, only to find nothing. "Until February 2005, we were on the crest of a wave," he says.

There was the grand new building; the university had secured funding commitments from the province and Ottawa, roughly seven times

richer, per student, than other provincial universities; and FNUC had its first Canada research chair. And yet, Mr. Stevenson says, "we thought we could come tumbling down at any time because success breeds jealousy. We heard many rumours about the chiefs being jealous because they were not being involved enough."

Perhaps, adds Winona Wheeler, former dean of the Saskatoon campus, "they thought we were getting too big for our pants." After Mr. Watson took over, racial politics began to take hold at First Nations University which hadn't been there before. There was a protest on campus to demand that Metis and American Indians be cleansed from the university's staff. "It was horrific," Ms. Wheeler says.

The research chair was lost. The province pressured the university to clean up its governance, and in November 2005, the school commissioned reports recommending changes. They were ignored. The Association of Universities and Colleges put the school's membership on probation.

A new report, commissioned from Manley Begay, director of the Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy at the University of Arizona, was released yesterday, after several delays. It recommended, much as the

2005 report did, a smaller board, at "arm's length" from FSIN -- "insuring the careful separation of governance from politics." FSIN chiefs announced a special assembly in March to ratify it.

It may come too late. Whatever health the school once boasted is gone. First Nations University of Canada had broken even every year before 2005; in the years following Mr. Watson's purge, the province repeatedly stepped in to bail out multimillion-dollar deficits.

In November, the university's financial officer, Murray Westerlund, sent the board's audit committee a memo alleging he was "isolated" from senior management, and ordered not to communicate with the provincial or federal government. He raised concerns about hundreds of thousands of dollars paid to the university president, Charles Pratt, and his vice-president of administration, Al Ducharme-- both installed by Mr. Watson -- as well as others, that he said violated policy. And about "unusual" payments to board directors, and questionable staff trips to Las Vegas and Hawaii. He was fired and is suing for wrongful dismissal.

This appeared to be the last straw for the province. In February, a "shocked" Advanced Education Minister Rob Norris announced he was pulling the university's annual $5.2-million funding. "This is a regrettable, but necessary decision," he said. "It is time for politicians to step back and the academic leadership to step forward."

Mr. Lonechild immediately resigned from the university board, prompting remaining directors to follow. Mr. Pratt and Mr. Ducharme were placed on leave pending an investigation into the alleged improprieties.

If Mr. Norris's move was, as some suspect, a temporary pressure tactic, the announcement days later by Indian and Northern Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl that Ottawa was cancelling its annual $7-million grant to the school may have delivered a mortal blow. In contrast to Mr. Norris's subtle signals that the funding may yet return, when asked by CTV if he would consider restoring federal money if "fixes" were made, Mr. Strahl said, "Well, no. We've announced we're cancelling the funding as of March 31." He has talked of redistributing it to other aboriginal educational programs.

There has been talk this week that the First Nations University may be reborn, smaller, less ambitious, as a department of the University of Regina, which would receive and control any funding and oversee administration. It has given hope to some.

But not to Mr. Stevenson. With another school taking over, there ends the vision for an independent, aboriginal-run university, he says. "Everything the FSIN was supposed to be upholding is dashed."