Legion the last line of defence for education

I have just read the article on Nick Newbery’s junior high school texts, and the support given by the Royal Canadian Legion.

This brings me back 18 years, to the time when McGill University approached me to write a text book for the Inuktitut as a Second Language courses that we were teaching at Nunatta Campus. It was a worthy idea, but to our embarrassment none of the usual funding organizations would give us any money.

Finally David Wilman approached the Legion, and the text got published. The college stopped giving these fully intensive courses in 1999, but the texts are still in print, and there is still a demand for them.

Eighteen years later I am heartened to see that the Legion continues to step in to help in cultural education when the usual sources turn their backs. Old soldiers know all about the importance of the last line of defence.

Mick Mallon
Iqaluit