The legacy of storying with a dash of micro-management!

Transformative Educational Leadership Journal | ISSUE Spring 2024

In this narrative exploration of the power and legacy of storytelling, Geoff shares candid stories of his own learning throughout a powerful inquiry into relationship building with the sna’naw’as, the Nanoose First Nation.

By Geoff Steel

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Before you read Geoff’s story, we invite you to watch a seven-minute video of Dover Bay’s journey with the snaw’naw’asin learning to walk together. 

My dad was an epic storyteller, always in command of the room when we had a houseload of guests. As an introverted kid, I would listen to his stories which always seemed to evolve with each telling. Most of his stories revolved around his childhood in Nanaimo in the 1940s, or his teen years in the 1950s. For his 1940’s era, I always pictured the kids from the Little Rascals. His stories of an earlier Nanaimo, where the kids ran around with BB guns and seemed to live completely unfettered from the adult world was very appealing to me. His 1950’s stories always morphed into an American Graffiti kind of sensibility and my dad spoke of his ’57 Chevy on a regular basis. I was aware at a young age what made a good storyteller and knew that the story would always be adjusted based on audience feedback and reaction. My dad has had his stories all but stripped away by the slowly unfolding scourge of dementia. My dad was the reason I became interested in history, which led to my pursuit of an education degree so I could teach history, which led to my current role as a school administrator. Although still that introverted kid inside, I can trace my evolution back to the smoky, alcohol-fueled living rooms in the 1970s, listening to a master storyteller weave his tales.

The more I think of our school and my role as principal the more I recognize the importance of listening to the stories of our community and telling the stories of the school. “Indigenous Community: Rekindling the Teachings of the Seventh Fire” by GA Cajete resonated with me on so many levels. As a history teacher, I instinctively knew I needed to ensure the story was told so students could relate and would recall the lessons. The notion that “Western education separates information from the story context and presents instead data, descriptions, theories and formula” never crossed my mind. I taught History 12 multiple times and likely made few if any references to Indigenous learnings and never a reference that the course was a Western perspective on history. The good thing about this past decade since I left teaching, is that we have come a long way in recognizing bias and privilege in our instruction.

As I continue to navigate my TELP inquiry to build a stronger connection between Dover Bay and the sna’naw’as people, I realize that the stories of the missteps are as important as the successes. Sometimes the missteps are part of a successful story.

One great example of this and my own journey would be our first ever Indigenous Families night. Our team at Dover worked closely with our representatives from sna’naw’as to invite every Indigenous student and their family to our school for a meal together. To me, this was a daunting event because there were so many unknowns and moving parts. Firstly, if you invite all 120 Indigenous students and they all show up and bring one guest, that would be 240 people. If they bring multiple family members that number could double. I spoke to Michelle, our Indigenous Support Teacher, and she seemed unworried. She commented that when NDSS did the same thing, they had about 30 people show up. Okay, I thought – I need to stand down and not get too uptight about this. We talked it over as a team, Michelle, Alistair (Learning Leader for SS and Truth and Reconciliation), Allison (Classroom teacher and Métis heritage), and Tsumqwatun (sna’naw’as Knowledge keeper). They all seemed fine with sending this invitation out to all Indigenous Students.

Story One: Micro to Macro Manager

I was starting to make my peace with this whole scenario until I talked to Auntie Shirley. Auntie Shirley Bob is sna’naw’as and she is someone who comes in with her family team and they prepare luncheons for our students and staff on a regular basis. Auntie Shirley has let me know on multiple occasions that she has cooked for up to 400 people in the Big House. She is an experienced caterer. She knows what she is doing, and she is a lovely person. We met with her and outlined the scenario, and she said no problem, we set the calendar date of February 16^th for the first ever Dover Bay Indigenous Family night. Auntie Shirley said she would prepare chop suey, chow mein, lasagna, salad, and desserts for everyone. We just needed to let her know the week prior how things were going with feedback from our families.

The week of the big event we had 60 students confirm that they were going to attend with many of them indicating multiple family members were coming. With this update, Michelle and I met with Auntie Shirley and let her know that we had 60 students confirmed. Auntie Shirley was ready for action and when she stated she was going grocery shopping I knew the wheels were in motion. She then said that she would need $200.00 to get the groceries. I would have visibly stopped in my tracks. I remember saying, how much? When she repeated the amount, I reminded her of the Affordability Fund from the BC Government and that we would have plenty of money for groceries. Nope, I only need $200.00. This is when my worry meter spiked and my micro-manager gene started to get twitchy. Later that afternoon the first snowflakes started to fall.

Mother nature began to interfere in our plans in a big way as the week wore on. With snow accumulating and the forecast looking bleak, we had to send out a cancellation for our February 16^th day. I was sorry that this was cancelled, but we were able to reschedule for the following Thursday. Auntie Shirley froze her perishable groceries, and we were now awaiting our Indigenous Families the following week. Sending the students home with revised invitations, we continued our preparations for the big night. We had draw prizes, arts and crafts, and tsumqwatun ready to do the welcome to territory and an opening song for us. Everything was coming together, but the food situation would continue to build in my mind.

The weather cooperated and on February 23^rd we opened our doors to our Indigenous Families. Our team, including my wonderful clerical staff setup the multiple purpose room with tablecloths and tea lights, cedar boughs, etc. It looked absolutely magical; now we just had to wait to see who would come. In hindsight, I should have stayed out of our kitchen area, but I didn’t. I went in to see Auntie Shirley and her wonderful team. She had one bag of three romaine lettuces from Costco, and one package of chicken breast for the chop suey. Her nephew and niece were busy preparing food and I could see that the chicken was mostly cooked up and it amounted to just a few cups. My full-on privileged brain when it came to groceries was absolutely on fire. I was thinking how if I was feeding my extended family for Christmas, we would easily far exceed the $200.00 and that would be just for ten of us. It was at this point that I approached Auntie Shirley. Using my most respectful approach, but still riddled with anxiety, I broached the subject of food quantity. Auntie Shirley could see that I was concerned and reluctantly admitted that she needed some more lettuce, parmesan, and croutons. I said, how about some more chicken? She quietly conceded that I could send someone out for more chicken. As I crossed our dining area to send someone for the additional groceries, I could see the first guests arriving, sitting at the tables, and engaging in arts and crafts. This is when I completely lost control of my cool and shed my micro-manager guise and fell into full on macro-manager.

With my white privilege on full display, I went to Krista’s office, my head secretary. I told her my concerns and then suggested we order some pizzas just to be on the safe side. After my description of what I saw, Krista said she would phone around and eventually we found a pizza place that could deliver 20 pizzas within the hour. That’s right. 20 pizzas. At first I felt that this was the right thing to do. I have since viewed this as a White Saviour kind of mentality. In all fairness, when I was a teen and in my full-on introverted phase, I did read all of Edgar Rice Burrough’s Tarzan series.

The pizzas on order, I went back to the multi-purpose room to visit and mingle with the incoming Indigenous Families. A quick reminder that this was a backup night, as the previously advertised night had been postponed, but the numbers in the MPR were quite low. I went directly to Michelle to query where everyone was. She didn’t seem to know having spoken today with several students that confirmed their attendance but were no-shows. I went over to check on Auntie Shirley and her team. They were busily putting the finishing touches on the chow mein, chop suey and lasagna. Everything smelled delicious. I made some comments to that effect, and then referenced that I had ordered some pizza to just to be on the safe side. I could tell by Auntie Shirley’s reaction that this was an unwelcome vote of non-confidence. I instantly recognized that I had overstepped in a big way. Turning back to the MPR I could see that we had approximately 22 attendees. Far fewer than the 50 confirmed attendees and the possibility of that number being 100 with guests. In other words, Auntie Shirley’s original food preparation was right on target.

We opened the evening with tsumqwatun’s beautiful prayer and song. We ran through a few door prizes and many of the attendees were busily making bracelets at the craft station. I watched as people lined up to get their food. We served from our cafeteria servery; the steam trays held the delicious home-made dishes that Auntie’s team were serving to everyone on their plates. Above the servery, were the five columns of pizza with four boxes in each column. I watched with a broken heart as I saw many of the children start with the pizza and cover their plates leaving little room for the home-made fare. Near the end of the evening, I approached Auntie Shirley and her entire team. I offered them a heart-felt apology for getting involved in their business.

If there is one thing I have no problem with, it’s apologizing when I have screwed up. I have referenced my father a lot, but my mother is the one I get the apology gene from.

The worst part of my apology was their graciousness. They acted completely unphased as if they hadn’t noticed the wall of pizza boxes that had blocked their view of the guests that they were serving. After apologizing multiple times, I left them and went back out to the guests who seemed to be having a great time. Fortunately, there was a certain degree of redemption offered to ease my tortured soul. All of the leftover food was bundled up and sent along home with our guests. Some families walked away with an entire box of pizza and containers of lasagna and salad. There was no food left behind, and I could see that most everyone felt the evening had gone well. We are currently planning the next Indigenous Family Evening for June. The key differences would be it will be outdoors, and it will be a barbeque. The second difference is that we are going to invite the Indigenous Families specifically but will open it to all families. I have already breathed a sigh of relief with the barbeque, because if we have more people than expected, we could pop up to Costco to get some more hot dogs. I know one thing for sure, I am not going to involve myself in the food preparation at all. I hope.

Story Two: Summer Heat at The sna’naw’as Winter Camp

One of the most beautiful aspects of our journey to connect meaningfully as a school with the sna’naw’as is to have students and staff visiting the community of the sna’naw’as people . Growing up in Nanaimo, you did not have school trips to any of the snuneymuxw or sna’naw’as reserves. Not only did you not have field trips but the two Nations were never mentioned, to my recall, in any classes I took as a student. We learned about the Inuit, Sioux, and Huron as past entities. So, to have our school acknowledging territory on a regular basis and our staff actively encouraging interactions with the Nations is monumental. It was a wonderfully hot day in April when Alistair and Allison loaded their classes into the big old yellow school bus and took them to the Nanoose Nation for two field trips, one in the morning and one more in the afternoon. I was lucky enough to accompany the afternoon field trip and will relay the story of that trip through my eyes.

To have two teachers as skilled as Alistair and Allison is a true blessing for any administrator. We also had Fred Speck, a new addition to our Dover Team, as an Indigenous cultural support worker, and Jessica a VIU student teacher who was having the best practicum ever. On this glorious day, where we were hitting temperatures in the mid-twenties, our students were in a very relaxed state of mind. We had a Philosophy 12 and Indigenous Studies 12 class on the bus that day and Alistair let them know in advance that we don’t know exactly what will happen on this trip today. Other than it would be great. This was classic Alistair King, a true kid whisperer. We made the quick drive to the Nanoose Reserve which is within ten minutes from our school. To get to the reserve you pass by a number of signs that say no trespassing and private property before descending the hill to the reserve which is right on the ocean. Our students literally exited the bus right next to Nanoose Bay on a truly spectacular day. To my knowledge, a first for all of the students.

After disembarking, the students made their way to Auntie Shirley’s home where we were all greeted warmly by her and her family and tsumqwatun and his two children. Auntie Shirley’s front porch is literally steps from the beach and our students were in awe of the setting. We gathered and some words of welcome were said and then Auntie Shirley invited us into her home to load up our plates with her home-made spaghetti and fry bread. She also had shellfish, fish and dessert. It was incredible to see how easily the students fell into the moment. They took their plates and went and sat by the water lazing in the spring heat that felt like summer. Many of them found their way to the beach and were skipping stones, nobody was on their phones. I couldn’t help but feel how decompressed everyone was. This was such a stark contrast to the bell schedule and industrialized school system that we had just exited, our beloved Dover Bay Secondary.

During our lunch I made casual conversation with a number of people to pass the time. It felt nice to be able to wander around on the grass and feel the warmth washing over me and see the smiles on everyone’s faces. I was talking to Fred Speck as we looked across Nanoose Bay to the Canadian and American navy bases on the other side. I casually mentioned to Fred that my father had told me that during World War II, my father was born in 1939 so he would have been just a child, the bay was filled with warships. He had told me that there were so many, you could have walked across the bay on them. Fred looked at me thoughtfully and thanked me for sharing that story. He said he would remember that story forever. I thought about that comment. I have heard stories my whole life, but to thank someone in such a thoughtful way for sharing was so different from how we usually show our appreciation. It’s usually with a smile, laughter, or a reciprocated related story.

Later, I spent some time chatting with tsumqwatun and his son Jaylen. They had been south of Nanaimo at Wildwood at a canoe steaming ceremony the previous day. I opened some dialogue around the concept of steaming a dugout canoe. tsumqwatun shared that the steaming process allowed the log to open up wider than a carver could get it, making the canoe much more spacious. Jaylen explained that rocks had to be heated in a fire and then placed into the water within the canoe. Jaylen was watching me closely when he shared the hardest part of the process. He explained how the hot rocks had to be packed by hand and placed into the canoe. I wildly erupted, “You pack the rocks from the fire in your bare hands?” He paused for a brief moment and I caught the glint in his eye as he said “Uh, no…” while bursting into laughter. I burst into laughter as did tsumqwatun and I complimented him on having some fun at my expense. It was a great moment.

After we finished up our meal, and said our hay ch q’a’s to Auntie Shirley we re-boarded the bus for the second part of our journey. The bus headed north on Highway 19 for five minutes and we then headed onto Nanoose Bay Road, quickly turning onto Powder Point Rd. and then onto Rowland Road where we disembarked in St. Mary’s Anglican Church parking lot. To understand this day, you have to understand that we had an exceptionally cold and wet Spring up until this point. Here we were walking down this road, that I had never been on before seeking the waters of Nanoose Bay. On our way the students were gawking at the million dollar homes, one of them with a treehouse nicer than a lot of homes in some parts of Nanaimo. When we got to the beach we stepped onto the shoreline pebbles and headed south down the beach in search of tsumqwatun and his two children. On our way, we passed two sun bathers that seemed shocked to suddenly have a bus load of teenagers approaching. As we continued down the beach we smelled the smoke of tsumqwatun’s fire. He was seated facing the ocean, wearing his cedar bough hat.

Our students were directed into a circle with the fire in the center and you could tell that the students were engaged. This was one of the times when you just felt the gravity of the moment. It was very spiritual. tsumqwatun did what he is absolutely gifted with, capturing everyone in his heart with his deeply thoughtful words.

Starting us out in hul’q’umi’num’ in such a good way. tsumqwatun shared with us stories on this day, that I and many of our students and staff will never forget. As GA Cajete states, “Stories have deep roots. They stem not only from the physiology and process of the brain, but also from the very heart of the human psyche.” When tsumqwatun speaks, or sings, or drums — you can see that this takes an emotional toll on him. As we stood on the beach that day, we could see across to the southern side of the bay where we had eaten lunch with Auntie Shirley. tsumqwatun explained to us the significance of where we were.

He let us know that we were standing on the traditional location of the sna naw as people’s winter camp, known as mae lsun’we’gun. Many of our people have never been to this spot, he said. tsumqwatun went on to explain that when the reserve lands were being determined the government representative that came arrived at the summer camp of the sna’naw’as people.

According to tsumqwatun, the agent looked around at the small number of sna’naw’as people and determined that their summer camp location was more than enough land for them. This was a time where the numbers had been diminished by warfare and the impacts of colonialism and had yet to rebound. Just like that, the sna’naw’as people were cut off from their seasonal rounds. They could no longer utilize the winter camp location that we were standing on that day. Without explicitly saying, it was obvious to us that this would severely limit the livelihood of the sna’naw’as people and their ability to continue their traditional ways. It was after this reserve system was established that the decision to put a highway and railroad through sna’naw’as territory placed further losses and hardships on the people.

Listening to him speak while we were staring into the fire, and smelling the smoke made a lasting impression on me. The spectacular setting seemed to energize the stories and made them come to life. While he was speaking I looked south, following the rugged coastline and imagined climbing the ridge off of the beach and walking up to Dover Bay Secondary. If you walk directly towards the shoreline from Dover Bay Secondary, you will need to take stairs down one of the many beach accesses and follow the steep pathways to the beach. When I arrived at Dover, I investigated the naming of our school. I always found it perplexing that there was no water body called Dover Bay. According to staff knowledgeable with our school history and early yearbooks, the name Dover was chosen because the steep shoreline was deemed similar to the white cliffs of Dover, England. The other Dover analogy was that just as people came and went to England through Dover. Students came and went through our school entering in grade eight and leaving in grade twelve. I’m not sure how the name Bay was added, as the closest bay is known as Nanoose Bay. The traditional territory of the Sna’naw’as people. As we continue down our path towards Truth and Reconciliation, I could see the name of our school coming into question.

tsumqwatun had shared additional stories and songs that day. Everyone will have their favourites and remember them in their own way. One additional story tsumqwatun told was of the Watcher, an important part of sna’naw’as history. The Watcher was positioned at the top of what we know as the Nanoose Notch which was looming over us as we listened to the story. The Watcher’s job was to watch for raiding canoes coming down from the North so he could warn his people and set off a chain of runners to warn the other Coast Salish peoples in snuneymuxw, stz’uminus, and Cowichan. It was shortly before this story, or after that tsumqwatun shared a song with us. He was joined by his two wonderful children, his son Jaylen and his daughter Kyrrah. Jaylen and tsumqwatun began drumming softly as we gazed into the fire. Shortly into the song Kyrrah began singing along with the drumming. The effect was stunning, and I could see many students lift their gaze from the fire and watch Kyrrah as she sang so powerfully and beautifully for us that day. At the end of her song, she wiped the tears from her eyes. I could tell that she had the gift that her father had, to channel her words from deep within her heart. As we had to get back to the big yellow school bus, we had students fetch water and sand to put out the humble fire. I sheepishly asked tsumqwatun and his family if I could take a picture of them and they agreed, though you could see they were not comfortable posing for pictures. We then ambled back down the beach, making small talk with the sun bathers, as we headed back up the road to the busses. One of the beautiful homes had a team of gardeners ensuring everything looked nice for the spring.