Events happening in and around Winnipeg for National Day for Truth and Reconciliation

Canada's second National Day for Truth and Reconciliation will be marked this Friday.

Sept. 30 was set aside as a federal statutory holiday last year to honour the children who died while attending residential schools and the survivors, families and communities still affected by that legacy. 

More than 150,000 First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were forced to attend church-run, government-funded residential schools between the 1870s and 1997.

The move to have an official day to commemorate those affected by the schools came shortly after the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation reported the discovery of what are believed to be more than 200 unmarked graves on the grounds of a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C. But the Truth and Reconciliation Commission had called for its creation six years earlier as one of its 94 calls to action. 

Sept. 30 is also known as Orange Shirt Day, when people wear orange T-shirts to acknowledge how residential schools affected and continue to impact Indigenous peoples. 

A number of events have been planned in Winnipeg and beyond to mark the occasion in Manitoba this year. Here are some of them.

• The Manitoba Runners' Association will hold a reconciliation half-marathon run at 8 a.m. near the former Birtle Residential School in the western Manitoba community of Birtle, about 100 kilometres northwest of Brandon.
• The Wa-Say Healing Centre will hold a pipe ceremony and survivors walk starting at The Forks in Winnipeg at 10 a.m. and ending at the RBC Convention Centre, where the healing centre is also hosting the second annual Orange Shirt Day powwow at 1 p.m.
• An Every Child Matters youth event will be held at the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre at 445 King St. from 10:30 a.m. until 1 p.m. The event will include a sacred fire, elder teachings, a feast, and a ceremony to unveil a memorial project.
• The Louis Riel Institute will host a Métis moccasin and paper vest workshop at the Children's Museum from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
• The Winnipeg Art Gallery-Qaumajuq will host a day of special programming devoted to the day from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. 
• The non-profit Inuit resource organization Tunngasugit will host the Winnipeg urban Inuit feast at the Valour Community Centre from 1 to 5 p.m.
• The Winnipeg Blue Bombers orange jersey game will begin at 7 p.m.
• Orange Shirt Days at the Manitoba Museum will feature special, all-day programming focused on the history of residential schools. The museum is offering complimentary admission to its galleries and planetarium from Sept. 30 to Oct. 2, and encourages attendees to wear orange.
• APTN will showcase special programming throughout the day.