Dress Purple with Tikinagan and Beastie Valley 

Tikinagan Child and Family Services - Special to The Bulletin

Show children, youth, and families you’re there to support them by wearing purple on October 27th. Dress Purple Day is important to our organization, communities, and region. It offers an opportunity to encourage everyone to speak up for every child and youth’s right to safety and well-being in all spaces. Not just physical safety and well-being—children and youth have the right to be supported in all spaces. 
This annual event gives Tikinagan the opportunity to show that we are here for our children, youth, and families as a resource. Our philosophy at Tikinagan, Mamow Obiki-ahwahsoowin, which means “everyone working together to raise our children,” doesn’t just include Tikinagan staff. It includes the whole community in our 30 First Nations as we all work together to raise our children. 
This year, Tikinagan is overjoyed to partner with Windsor-Essex CAS and the Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies for October’s Dress Purple Day campaign, featuring the Beastie Valley video series. 
The Beastie Valley videos are an incredible tool to reach our First Nations students. It’s an easy message to understand. It’s relatable. It’s fun. For teachers, it’s a helpful, ready-to-use resource that is easy to adopt into their Ontario curriculum. 
These messages are so important to our communities. Learning how to ask for help, feeling safe, and having people respect your boundaries are conversations our children and youth need to hear. We are thrilled that we can get these videos into the hands of educators to help spread the message that our agency is here to help. 
We created an educator toolkit that encourages teachers to show and discuss the Beastie Valley videos as starting point conversations with students. Additionally, promo items have been sent to schools in our 30 First Nation communities who expressed an interest to participate in the event. 
We encourage the community of Northwestern Ontario to participate by: 
• Wearing purple on October 27th; 
• Let the children, youth and families in your life know you are there to support them; 
• Learn about children in care and how you can support them, destigmatize views about them and ensure they have a safe environment inside and outside the home. 
To learn more about Dress Purple Day, the Toolkit, or how you can participate, go to https://www.tikinagan.org/dresspurple/