It's Orange Shirt Day and the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

September 30th is a day to talk about the effects of Residential Schools; about the trauma that continues to ripple across Turtle Island. It’s a day that honors the experiences of Indigenous survivors, celebrates our resilience and affirms a now familiar phrase: every child matters.

It started with an orange shirt. Taken from a little girl in residential school.

Every year on September 30 that little girl tells her story. Phyllis Webstad was 6 years old when she was forced to leave her Secwpemc community - Canoe Creek Indian Band - and attend St. Joseph's Mission, near Williams Lake, BC. For the occasion, her grandmother bought her a new orange shirt. But it was taken away from her when she arrived at the school. Phyllis has been sharing the story of her orange shirt for ten years now. She’s written several books about it, including her latest called, Every Child Matters.

St. Joseph's Mission operated for nearly a hundred years. It closed in 1981 but many children never returned home. Since St. Joseph’s closed there have been two separate investigations using ground-penetrating radar. One-hundred-fifty-nine potential burial sites were detected on the school grounds. On September 5th of this year, Williams Lake First Nation purchased the site. Chief Willie Sellars of Williams Lake First Nations says they want to ensure the integrity of investigations into children who disappeared while attending the school.