Campus to mark Orange Shirt Day with walk

Members of the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford will mark National Day of Remembrance/Orange Shirt Day with a walk on Tuesday to remember the children placed in Indigenous residential schools.    

The public is welcome to attend the walk at 5 p.m. to learn more about the schools and their effect on communities. The walk will begin at the parking loop of the Frame-Westerberg Commons. Parking is located next to the Wick Chapel.

The walk will begin at Commons, continue to the Richard E. and Ruth McDowell sport and Fitness Center and then back to the Commons, where there will be a gathering in front of the Panther for a closing reception. Participants are asked to wear orange in honor of Orange Shirt Day, or as it’s known in the United States, National Day of Remembrance for Truth and Reconciliation.

Members of the men's and women’s lacrosse teams, Pitt-Bradford campus surrounding community members will walk to remember the Indigenous children who were sent to residential schools and the lasting impacts. 

Before the walk, speakers will talk about the impact of residential schools on their families. There were more than 500 residential schools in 19th- and 20th-century America that Indigenous children were often forced to attend. There they were beaten, starved or otherwise abused when they spoke their Native languages.    

Survivors and their descendants have adopted the orange shirt as a symbol to commemorate the residential school experience. It originates from a story about a 6-year-old girl who lived at the St. Joseph Mission Residential School in Canada, where the orange shirt her grandmother had bought her was taken from her and replaced with a school uniform.    

Tyrone Bowen-Collateta, a senior health and physical education student from Salamanca, N.Y., who is Seneca, is helping to organize the remembrance walk. The Seneca are part of the Haudenosaunee Nation that invented lacrosse, which is more than a game to the Indigenous people who play it.    

Bowen-Collateta’s great-grandfather, Ralph Bowen, was both opposed to the construction of the Kinzua Dam and a survivor of the Thomas Indian School.    

“My great-grandfather was a survivor who fought relentlessly so that I could speak our language and embrace our sacred game,” he said. “Each time I pick up my stick, I play in remembrance of those who suffered and those who were lost.

“This Orange Shirt Day let’s stand together to ensure their stories are never forgotten. By wearing orange, we acknowledge their hardships and contribute toward the ongoing journey toward healing and reconciliation.”

The men’s and women’s lacrosse teams will be selling orange T-shirts in honor and remembrance of Indigenous children who attended residential schools during Light Up the Quad from 6:30 to 9 p.m. Friday in the Bromeley Quadrangle and from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday and Tuesday in the Frame-Westerberg Commons. Cost of the shirts is $20, and proceeds will be donated to the Orange Shirt Society.

Those unable to attend are also asked to wear orange to raise awareness.

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