Sask. government questioned about handling of abuse allegations at Legacy Christian Academy

Three former students of the Legacy Christian Academy were at the Sask. Legislature on Thursday to request another meeting with members of government.

The Saskatoon private school, formerly named the Saskatoon Christian Centre Academy, was hit with a class action lawsuit in August when former students alleged sexual and physical abuse.

The students, Caitlin Erickson, Stefanie Hutchinson and Coy Nolin, spoke with reporters on Thursday and highlighted their struggle in speaking with government officials.

Erickson, who graduated from the school in 2005, said she tried contacting Premier Scott Moe’s office to have a discussion and relay some of the concerns they continue to have but said they have not heard back.

“It’s about not having this happen again, not having a lapse of regulations, not letting something go unregulated for this amount of time,” she said. “It’s about children never going through the kinds of things that we’ve gone through and we’ve had a lot of adults that have been in a position of authority that have failed us over and over and over,” she said.

“Sitting today in the legislature kind of feels like a repeat of that, listening to the comments made.”

Erickson said there hasn’t been any new information on the legal case but hopes to get updates later this winter as lawyers work to get certification. She said all of the parties have been served the statement of claim.

During Question Period, leader of the opposition Carla Beck questioned Premier Moe on why his government didn’t act immediately when they heard of the abuse.

“What kind of leader waffles and sits on their hands when it comes to the safety of our kids? Why did it take the premier and his government so long to act on allegations of physical and sexual abuse?” she asked. “Paddling and even exorcisms in a publicly funded Saskatchewan school?”

Premier Moe said the ministry received a note with a number of names and allegations on Aug. 9, 2022.

“I believe the ministry, that very day, had provided those names to the Saskatchewan Professional Teachers Regulatory Board. It was Aug. 10, a day later that the minister of education had came to cabinet with a number of increased oversight regulations that he had asked to move forward on cabinet,” Moe responded.

Education Minister Dustin Duncan said the former students took the allegations to the police, not the ministry, and that they were made aware of those on Aug. 9, 2022.

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Erickson said there should be no debate as to the timeline of the communication and said she contacted the Ministry of Education on June 20, 2022.

Duncan said he was made aware of an email that 22 students had initiated a criminal complaint to the police with a high level of allegations, which had been turned over to prosecutions.

“When we receive an email like that, we send that to the ministry to say we need a response,” he said. “I think the challenge was that because it was 2005, there really was no oversight and so the ministry would have had no records, certainly, of any complaints because they weren’t filed with the ministry,” he said.

He said at that time, other stories were starting to come out and he was trying to determine what, if anything, would they really know about that period of time.

“The email didn’t indicate who the allegations were against and so we wouldn’t have had knowledge of, I guess, the situation around those complaints or the individuals because it was a time before it was regulated,” he said. “It was trying to find out what we did know and how we could respond to this and it was Aug. 9 when we first received the civil suit, when it was filed in court.”

Erickson said listening to Duncan in the legislature was disheartening.

“Hearing him continuing to give himself a pat on the back for closing Grace Academy was really disheartening because Grace Academy should have neve been opened as per the government’s own regulations,” she said. “At that time, the individual who opened the school did not have a bachelor of education.”

“That’s a glaring look at how bad the gaps are in the legislation.”

Erickson said at Legacy Christian Academy, a United States based textbook which is banned in several places, is still being used today. She also showed booklets they used which she claimed had sexist and inappropriate comics.

The former students joined the NDP in questioning what is being taught in some Christian school textbooks. Love read from a textbook he said was being used in the schools, during Question Period Thursday.

“This book says scientific evidence tends to support the idea that men and dinosaurs existed at the same time,” Love said.

“References the Loch Ness monster as proof that dinosaurs still exist today. This is being taught in schools funded by that minister.”

The government said the provincial curriculum is now followed with time set aside for faith-based teaching.

“The provincial curriculum has to be incorporated Mr. Speaker into all these schools that receive funding Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker I trust the officials in the Ministry of Education certainly know the regulations,” Duncan said during Question Period.

Erickson said any topic they were writing on had to come from an approved list.

“You would have been kicked out for questioning anything,” she said. “If you talked negatively about the school, there would be discipline.”

Duncan said he doesn’t want to leave the impression that the school is the same in 2022 as it was in 2015.

“Since 2012, the regulations have been changed. I’ve put in place regulations and steps to increase the amount of oversight we’re looking at. If there’s more steps that need to be taken, we’re discussing that with the ministry,” he said.

“If there are additional changes that need to be made, we’ll make those.”

The government has appointed administrators at two Christian schools. The NDP say their observations and findings should be made public.