Post-secondary distance education in a contemporary colonial context: Experiences of students in a rural First Nation in Canada

Abstract

Post-secondary distance education gives students and their families living in remote and rural regions the option to stay in their communities while they study instead of moving closer to the universities in cities. Post-secondary distance education is an option in many rural and remote First Nation (Indigenous) communities in Canada; however there are many challenges to successful adoption in these communities. There are also many opportunities for post-secondary institutions to expand their abilities and capacity in developing and delivering appropriate content supporting these unique, selfgoverning environments in Canada. We explore the experiences of students from a rural First Nation in Canada with post-secondary distance education, focusing on how different delivery methods offer both opportunities and challenges for communitybased students. The study is situated in the context of contemporary colonialism in Canada.

A posthumanist critique of flexible online learning and its “anytime anyplace” claims

“…Still, the picture isn’t entirely grim. Recent work by Simon, Burton, Lockhart, and O’Donnell (, p. 1), makes evident the complex and political reality of what the flexibility of online education offers for Indigenous people. In the context of remote communities, online education isn’t entirely incompatible with anti‐colonial principles as it enables Indigenous students who live in rural communities to remain where they can “contribute to their community’s social and economic capital.” But as their research also shows, Western pedagogical paradigms and objectives can prove insufficient for the needs of Indigenous communities.…”

Indigenous Access to Skilled Jobs in the Canadian Forest Industry: The Role of Education

“…More recently, Pidgeon (2016) has explored how post-secondary education institutions could achieve meaningful Indigenous inclusion. Based on interviews with community members of Elsipogtog First Nation in the Canadian province of New Brunswick, Simon, Burton, Lockhart, and O'Donnell (2014) explored the role that distance education could play in making post-secondary education accessible to Indigenous people, specifically within the context of Indigenous control over education.…”

Radical Flexibility and Relationality as Responses to Education in Times of Crisis

“…McMillan Cottom argues that such an orientation inevitably favors white, able-bodied male learners of particular socio-economic status by virtue of the significant privileges that often come with occupying that identity space. Research into the challenges of flexible education for female and BIPOC students, for example, supports this thesis (McMillan Cottom 2017; Selwyn 2011; Simon et al 2014). In contrast, the imagined ideal learner is the learner as a good liberal humanist subject (Houlden and Veletsianos 2019), he who is independent and above all has fully internalized responsibility as being entirely located in and oriented to the individual (Houlden and Veletsianos 2020).…”