Truth and Reconciliation Statement

Updated March 28, 2025

KnowledgeNow is committed to Truth and Reconciliation for Indigenous Peoples in Canada, a modern, colonial state in the ancestral Indigenous territories of Turtle Island, which now comprises Canada, the United States, and Mexico.

We exercise Truth and Reconciliation in accordance with our company values and mission, as well as being guided by the Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).

Acknowledging the Truth of Canada’s Colonial Past

We acknowledge the injustices perpetrated against Indigenous Peoples in what is now Canada. We acknowledge that many harms have been perpetrated against Indigenous Peoples for hundreds of years, since the very beginnings of settler colonialism, and that the creation of Canada as a country intensified these harms in the exercise of physical and cultural genocide.

We acknowledge that colonial policies and structures remain in place that disadvantage Indigenous Peoples, maintaining enforced poverty and substandard conditions in many Indigenous communities. We acknowledge that Indigenous Peoples continue to suffer a loss of culture, economic barriers, and intergenerational trauma due to policies and systems that have been imposed upon them and remain in place by various governments and agencies.

We acknowledge that as Canadians, we are not responsible for the colonial policies of our settler ancestors, but that we are responsible for contributing to the removal of these policies. We acknowledge our responsibilities in contributing to reconciliation of Canada’s shared colonial past to create a new, vibrant, and inclusive future that respects the heritage and sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples.

Acknowledging Ancestral Lands

KnowledgeNow is an entirely remote company. Our team works across Canada with members living and working in the ancestral lands of the 

  • Wolastoqiyik and Mi’kmaq, 

  • Kanienʼkehá:ka (Mohawk), 

  • Omàmìwininìwag (Algonquin), 

  • the shared lands of the Attiwonderonk (Neutral), Mississauga, Anishinaabe, and Haudenosaunee Confederacy, 

  • the shared lands of the Niitsítpiis-stahkoii (Blackfoot), Ĩyãħé Nakón mąkóce (Stoney), Michif (Métis), Ktunaxa ɁamakɁis (Kootenai), and Tsuut’ina Peoples, 

  • the shared lands of the Cree, Očhéthi Šakówiŋ (Sioux), Anishininiimowin (Oji-Cree), Anishinaabe, and Métis, 

  • and the shared lands of the Nłeʔkepmx Tmíxʷ (Nlaka’pamux), Cayuse, Umatilla, Walla Walla, and the Syilx (Okanagan) Peoples.

As settlers to these lands, we have claimed them as our homes, but we must renew a relationship in which we share these lands with their original inhabitants, respecting their ancestral sovereignty and their ancestral stewardship of their homelands.

To learn more about these Indigenous Peoples, their ancestral territories, and treaties, visit Native-Land.ca.

Acknowledging Treaties

Those of us at KnowledgeNow living and working in the ancestral territories of the Wolastoqiyik and Mi’kmaq in New Brunswick are in unceded and unsurrendered territories with relationships intended to be mediated by the Peace and Friendship Treaties (1725 to 1779). The Peace and Friendship Treaties define the sharing of land and its resources, with First Nations maintaining their sovereignty. However, the sovereignty of the Wolastoqiyik and Mi’kmaq and their rights under the Peace and Friendship Treaties have not been respected by colonial governments and society.

Those of us at KnowledgeNow living and working in the ancestral territories of the Kanienʼkehá:ka (Mohawk) in Montreal live in the territory of the Murray Treaty of Longueuil (1760). However, this was an agreement between the Wendat (Huron) and British, and does not include the Mohawk in Montreal and surrounding areas who were displaced from their ancestral homes to Montreal.

Those living and working in the territories of the Nłeʔkepmx Tmíxʷ (Nlaka’pamux), Cayuse, Umatilla, Walla Walla, and the Syilx (Okanagan) Peoples in British Columbia are in unceded and unsurrendered territories with no negotiated historic treaties. 

Some of the KnowledgeNow team lives and works in territories covered by the Upper Canada Land Surrenders that have a dubious history for being negotiated dishonestly by settlers, including areas covered by the Toronto Purchase, Head of the Lake Purchase, London Township Treaty 6, Treaty 16 (1815), and Treaty 18 (1818). 

KnowledgeNow also has team members living in territory covered by the Robinson-Huron Treaty (1850) and the Williams Treaty (1923), and team members living and working in the Numbered Treaty 1 and 7 territories.

In many instances, treaties were negotiated in bad faith by settlers. External pressures, such as the eradication of the bison/buffalo, forced some First Nations into negotiating The Numbered Treaties to maintain their survival—a situation that was deliberately constructed to weaken their communities to facilitate removing them from their ancestral territories and encouraging their assimilation into European culture. 

Despite the reasonable expectations of First Nations communities and their leaders when negotiating treaties, the colonial governments have consistently and purposefully failed to fulfill their treaty obligations. We as Canadians cannot be held responsible for feeling guilt or shame for these failures, but we do have a responsibility for righting those wrongs and supporting First Nations and other Indigenous Peoples in receiving justice, in supporting their sovereignty, for renewing treaty relationships, and fulfilling treaty obligations.

Acting in a Good Way Toward Reconciliation

Reconciliation is a collective endeavour. It requires all of our participation and is not the sole responsibility of Indigenous Peoples who have experienced generations of colonial violence. At KnowledgeNow, we are committed to doing what we can as an eLearning company and as individuals to achieve the Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action.

Reconciliation is aimed at repairing the health of Indigenous Peoples and their communities, and repairing the relationships between settlers and Indigenous Peoples. While Indigenous Peoples will gain the most from reconciliation, everyone in Canada will benefit from renewing respectful and responsible relationships with each other and the land.

As settlers, we must also proactively work towards reconciling the colonial injustices by creating and supporting a future that removes cultural, structural, and socio-economic barriers to the well-being of Indigenous Peoples, while also supporting Indigenous cultural and economic renewal, and sovereignty in all aspects of life.

We have a responsibility to support our Indigenous neighbours, friends, clients, partners, colleagues, students, and all our other relatives without making them carry the burden of repairing relationships broken by settler colonialism.

As eLearning professionals, we exercise our responsibilities toward reconciliation through education.

Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action

“The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) was created through a legal settlement between Residential Schools Survivors, the Assembly of First Nations, Inuit representatives and the parties responsible for creation and operation of the schools: the federal government and the church bodies” (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation).”

We recommend all Canadians down and read the TRC Calls to Action (PDF). They are an important and valuable part of reconciliation.

As a business that is educationally focused, we support Calls to Action 6 to 17 on education in particular while supporting all 94 Calls to Action in general. As a business, Call to Action 92 is directly applicable to our work in advancing the truth and reconciliation of Canada’s violent, racist, and genocidal past.

Call to Action 92

We [the Truth and Reconciliation Commission] call upon the corporate sector in Canada to adopt the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as a reconciliation framework and to apply its principles, norms, and standards to corporate policy and core operational activities involving Indigenous peoples and their lands and resources. This would include, but not be limited to, the following:

i. Commit to meaningful consultation, building respectful relationships, and obtaining the free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous peoples before proceeding with economic development projects.

ii. Ensure that Aboriginal peoples have equitable access to jobs, training, and education opportunities in the corporate sector, and that Aboriginal communities gain long-term sustainable benefits from economic development projects.

iii. Provide education for management and staff on the history of Aboriginal peoples, including the history and legacy of residential schools, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Treaties and Aboriginal rights, Indigenous law, and Aboriginal–Crown relations. This will require skills based training in intercultural competency, conflict resolution, human rights, and anti-racism.