FNUniv and Mastercard Foundation announce partnership to improve Indigenous education

The First Nations University of Canada (FNUniv) has partnered with the Mastercard Foundation with the goal of improving Indigenous post-secondary education.

On Friday morning, the Mastercard Foundation awarded FNUniv $22.3 million over the next five years.

The funds will focus on four key areas: taking steps towards full autonomy for the university, developing new priority-focused Indigenous programs, addressing economic reconciliation, as well as looking at the overall Indigenous post-secondary experience across Canada.

Jacqueline Ottmann, the President of FNUniv said the institution has never received this amount of financial support before and will do some real good for FNUniv.

“Encouraging real change. That will be systemic, structural change. Change at policy in ways that will once again support Indigenous students within the university and also our researchers and faculty,” she said.

Justin Wiebe from the Mastercard Foundation said since 2017, their EleV program has been working in service of young Indigenous people.

• Get the CTV News app for Saskatchewan breaking news alerts and top stories 

“For us it’s about a recognition of an organization that’s doing awesome work and has been doing awesome work for a long time. We’re here to do that work and expand it with them,” he said.

FNUniv regularly sees 1,000 students a year. They have three campuses in Saskatchewan and students working remotely across the province.