East coming west: Stories of implementing YES! for Schools in a Cree community

Abstract

The YES! (Youth Empowerment Seminar) for Schools program, taught by the International Association for Human Values (IAHV) is a six-week, school-based biopsycho-social intervention with a strong emphasis on yogic breathing practise. From late February to April 2014, the program was taught to students and staff at a school on a Cree reserve in Canada. This narrative inquiry explored the question: What do the stories of participants reveal about how this program fits within the particular cultural and socio-economic situation of this First Nations reserve community? This thesis shares the stories of four research participants as they described their experience of the YES! program to the researcher: a student, the school counsellor, an Elder and addictions counsellor at the school, and the mother of one of the students. Nine threads that run throughout the stories are identified: spirituality, youth, school, breathing, helping, resilience, non-interference, stones, and moving forward.