This week on Unreserved, meet some of the people changing Canada’s notoriously harmful child welfare system.

Darlene Keeper spent 18 years in Manitoba’s foster care system. Her experience mirrors that of tens of thousands of Indigenous kids in care. But now, at age 28, she’s earning a social work degree to one day help other young Indigenous people in the system.

Mary Burton is a Sixties Scoop survivor and the guardian of her grandchildren, who were also in foster care. She’s the executive director of Fearless R2W, an organization that helps parents in Winnipeg’s North End neighbourhood reunite with their children. She’s been advocating for families since she was in her 20s and calls this her “heart work.”

Julie LaPorte’s experience in the child welfare system, which includes losing her mother at 15, gives us insight into the impact of a child's apprehension on their whole family. Now 22, Julie is back in school with plans to open a healing centre one day and continue helping others who have gone through trauma and abuse.

Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan is the first community to make use of federal legislation that gives jurisdiction of child and family services back to First Nations. Eva Coles and Nicole Cook are the CEO and associate CEO of the Chief Red Bear Children’s Lodge, the child and family services agency on Cowesses. They’re building a new system from scratch and tending to a “home fire” of community and connection to do so.