GN scholarship aims to train homegrown social workers: minister
Margaret Nakashuk announces recipients of scholarship for students in social work, named after former MLA Rebekah Uqi Williams
Margaret Nakashuk, Minister of Family Services, announced five Nunavummiut to receive the Rebekah Uqi Williams Scholarship. (File photo)
Five Nunavut social work students are recipients of a $10,000 scholarship to help them further their studies in the hope they’ll return to work in the territory, Family Services Minister Margaret Nakashuk said Thursday.
Nakashuk announced the recipients of the Rebekah Uqi Williams Scholarship during the first day of the legislative assembly’s winter sitting in Iqaluit.
“We hope to see you join the team in the future,” Nakashuk said.
The scholarship aims to honor the legacy of Williams, a former MLA who died in April 2023, by supporting the studies of future social workers, Nakashuk said in a minister’s statement.
The Government of Nunavut created a memorial scholarship to honour former MLA Rebekah Uqi Williams. (File photo)
She said that since the launch of the scholarship last October, a total of 29 applications were received from Nunavummiut students pursuing a career in social work, counseling or psychology.
“Through this scholarship and the ambitions of these students, the legacy of Ms. Williams lives on,” Nakashuk said.
This year’s recipients are: Sheena Kayasark from Taloyoak; Carmen Rowsell from Iqaluit; Sylvia Kablutsiak from Arviat; Katherine Lyall from Taloyoak; and Pauline Pauloosie from Cambridge Bay/Taloyoak.
The students who received the awards are enrolled in social work or social services programs at Nunavut Arctic College, Laurentian University and Carleton University.
Nakashuk concluded by saying her department wishes all students good luck in their studies, and hopes to see them join the GN team in the future.
“Hopes” they will come back and work in Nunavut ???
Make it mandatory or repay the “scholarship”
Been tried before in other parts of the country – not legal.
Not only “not legal” it’s authoritarian and idiotic.
Show me the act where it is illegal. If they don’t provide the service that we are funding them for, then we don’t fund them in the first place. Scrap the program if they aren’t working in Nunavut.
Complete your studies and stay away from the Department of Family Services. Even after the Auditor Generals reports, this department is still a chaos. No proper structure, unqualified superiors, including supervisors and managers and a workload that no CSW can handle.
Start cleaning this dysfunctional up, from the top down. Jonathon, you have the skills and energy to do this, just don’t wait too long
About 10 years ago NAC graduated a large class of Social Workers.
Family Services had no open positions for them when they graduated.
That was a few years after NAC graduated 6 Inuit nurses.
None of them wanted to work in Nunavut, in part because they were not offered housing. Housing was for southern hires.
Health expected them to share a room with their siblings in their parents homes.
How many NTEP grads or homegrown social workers, nurses or other specializations stay in their field longer than a year in NU? The stats on this would be astonishing. The truth is… these other jobs come with constant responsibility, firm-working hours, stress of dealing with irrational members of the community, and the expectation of regularly attending work. Compare that with a cubicle position where those “around” you are also frequently late or not showing up (superiors and supervisors included) – and which form of employment would you prefer?